“What happened? Did he say no?” He looked at my face when I didn’t answer. “Becks, are you okay?”
I shook my head.
“You’re not okay?”
“No. Yes, I’m okay. But no, he didn’t say no.” I threw my arms around Will. “I’m going to get Jack.”
I knew what object I needed. Something small enough to carry. Something that made me instantly think of Jack the moment I saw it. Something tangible and tactile that I could press into the palm of my hand and identify without even seeing it.
The feel of it gave me an instant connection to Jack. I always kept it nearby, always at hand. Even after I’d Returned and things were so different between us, this object was my tether to the life I’d given up. The life I had before. The life with Jack.
I found it in my bedroom, under my bed. A note. Jack’s note.
Ever Yours
He had given it to me after the Christmas Dance last year. No amount of Everneath brain-suck could take away the meaning behind those two words. The same ones he had on his tattoo. I was sure of it.
I decided not to see my father and Tommy again. I didn’t leave a note or anything. If I didn’t make it back by tomorrow morning, that would mean I’d been in the Everneath for weeks. And I probably wasn’t ever coming back.
Will drove me to Cole’s condo. When we got there, we sat there in silence for a minute or two, then Will grabbed my hand. Squeezed it tight.
“I want to come with you,” he said.
“Absolutely not.”
“But I can help.” His eyes were pleading.
I couldn’t believe he was bringing this up now. “Will. You know you can’t come.”
“Why not?”
I watched him for a moment. He knew why. But maybe he needed me to tell him it was impossible so he could take comfort in the fact that he’d done everything he could. I listed the reasons.
“Number one, I doubt Cole would take you. Number two, your mother needs you, and I need you to take care of everything here. Number three, there is no way in hell I will be responsible for losing both of the Caputo brothers.”
He frowned and brought my hand to his lips. “I know you’re right.” He sighed. “I want my brother back,” he said. “But I don’t know if this is the right way.”
I brought his hand to my own lips. “This is the only way.”
“But you’re putting your trust in Cole. The same Cole who did everything he could to keep you and Jack apart.”
I sighed. “I’d be more worried about Cole’s motives if Max wasn’t so intent on keeping me away from him. If Cole had some evil plan, Max would be in on it. Not objecting to it.”
He looked forward, a helpless expression on his face. I opened my door. “I’ll see you soon. Maybe even tonight.”
Will only nodded.
“Watch after my family.”
He nodded again.
I slipped out, and before I was halfway up the staircase outside Cole’s condo, Will drove away. I put my hand in my pocket and pressed my fingertips against Jack’s note, feeling closer to him already.
TWELVE
NOW
The Surface. Cole’s condo.
Cole swung open the door and gestured for me to come inside. A clicking sound made me turn toward the living room, where Max was lounging on the couch. He fiddled with a silver lighter in his hand.
“What’s he doing here?” I asked.
“He’s coming with us.” At my expression, Cole added, “More specifically, he’s coming to keep me in line. I tend to make galactically stupid decisions when it comes to you, and the Everneath is not a place where you want to make stupid decisions. Besides, two of us will hide your energy better than just one.”
I held up my hands in a fine by me gesture. Cole was taking me to the Everneath. I wasn’t about to argue with anything, although I was pretty sure Max was also going to keep me from messing up Cole again.
Cole took off the guitar that had been strapped over his shoulder and placed the instrument gently in its case in the corner of the room.
“I’m going to miss you,” he said tenderly, his mouth turned up in a half smile.
“You’re not bringing your guitar?” I said. I rarely saw him without it.
Max and Cole both looked at me with alarmed expressions. “No,” Cole said. “I don’t want to die.”
“What do you mean?” I said warily.
“Music. It’s forbidden. Like the penalty-of-death kind of forbidden.”
“Why?”
Max clicked his lighter closed. “Because music is a powerful manipulator of emotions, and the Shades can’t control it,” he said.
“And the Shades don’t like things they can’t control.” Cole snapped the case shut and straightened up. “Speaking of things you can’t control, did you bring your token?”
I pulled the note out of my pocket. “Yes, but I don’t think I’m going to need it.”
“That’s because you’re currently standing on the Surface. Your brain is still intact.”
I sighed and slipped the paper back into my pocket. “When we get there … well, how will we avoid getting caught?”
Cole frowned and ran a hand through his hair. “Last time you dropped down in the New York City of the Everneath. I’m going to take us to … Oklahoma.” I must’ve looked lost, because he raced to the kitchen and came back with a piece of blank paper and a pencil in hand. With a sweeping gesture, he cleared the coffee table of everything on it, sending a few books, sheets of music, and a dirty coffee mug to the carpet. Then he put the paper down on top.
“Watch carefully.” He proceeded to draw a large circle, then a slightly smaller one inside it, and another and another until he had drawn five concentric circles leading to a bull’s-eye in the middle. “The Everneath is made up of elemental rings. The outermost one”—he pointed his pencil to the largest ring—“is the Ring of Earth. The five Common areas—cities, so to speak—are spread out evenly in this Ring of Earth.” He drew smaller circles evenly spaced within the Ring of Earth. “When you took off with a tuft of my hair in your hands, you landed in one of these Commons.” He pointed to one of the smaller circles in the outer ring. “This particular Common you went to is called Ouros. It means ‘mountain.’ It’s named that because the entrance—at the Shop-n-Go—is located in a mountain. Each Common has several entrances, or ‘rivers’ as your mythology books call them.”
I remembered reading about one of these, called the River Styx. I couldn’t remember the names of the others, although, if each Common had more than one entrance, then there were a lot of them. More than the mythology books knew about.
He moved his finger inward to the second-largest ring. “This one is the Ring of Water, then the Ring of Wind, then the Ring of Fire. There are no cities in these rings.”
I pointed to the middle circle, the bull’s-eye of his map. “What’s there?”
He looked up from his map. “Two things. The Feed caverns and the High Court, where the queen lives.”
I’d been to the Feed caverns. I hadn’t realized how close they were to the High Court. “So who exactly is in the High Court?”
“The queen, her chosen companion, and anyone else she wants.” He took the pencil and drew an X over the bull’s-eye. “We do not want to go there.”
“Why?”
“Well, besides the fact that it’s where the Shades and the queen live? Because the three rings that separate the High Court from the Commons—the Water, Wind, and Fire—are deadly. They’re the queen’s security system. They’re there to keep Everlivings out.”
“But then where are the Tunnels?”
He grimaced. “That’s the question. They’re hidden so nobody will mess with them. Only the Shades know where they are. But I’ve spent the last few weeks tracking down older Everlivings who might know something about their location. One of them believed the Tunnels were hidden in the void.” He pointed on his map to the space outside the largest ring. “We’re hoping he’s right. The void is made up of all the unstable areas, the places of unformed energy. But that also means it’s relatively uninhabited. It would be the perfect place to hide the Tunnels. So, my plan is to land us in the outer ring, between Commons”—he put his finger in the middle between two Commons, one of which was Ouros—“and see which way your tether to Jack leads us.”
“My tether to Jack?”
He stood up and put the tip of his finger over my heart. “You’re connected to him, and that bond is strong. It’s what’s keeping him alive. And when we’re down there, it will point us in the right direction.”
For some reason, the way he spoke of the tether made me think of Ariadne and the ball of twine she’d given to Theseus so he could find his way out of the labyrinth. I took in a few deep breaths, wondering if my connection to Jack could ever be so tangible.
“Are you sure?”
“Yes.” He removed his finger from my chest. “At least that’s what I learned from my search. Hopefully it’s true. Or we’ll get lost and the Shades will track you down and we’ll both die via Shade impalement.”
I narrowed my eyes at him.
He gave me an innocent look as if he hadn’t just said the word impalement. “Don’t worry. I don’t think that’s going to happen. Ready to go?” He stepped closer, and I flinched back. I guess I had trained myself a little too well to pull away from him.
His lips twitched. “Um, Nikki, if we’re going to do this, we’re going to have to touch.”
“I know. Sorry. It was a reflex.”
“I’ll try not to be offended.” He stepped closer again and took my hand. He smirked. “Your hand is clammy.”
“It is not.” But it was, and I knew why. I was being forced to trust the person in whom I had the least faith. I had no choice.
He squeezed my fingers. “Ready?”
Max stood up and came near us, ready to follow.
I closed my eyes for a moment. “Cole?”
“Yes?”
“Is it really …”—I pointed downward—“… underneath us?”
A faint smile touched his lips. “No more than hell is. But to get there we go …” He tilted his head toward the floor. “Ready?”
“Ready.” I’m coming, Jack.
The walls of his condo began to swirl right before my eyes; and just before everything went dark, Cole said, “The touchdown might be a little rougher than last time since we’re aiming for outside the Commons.”
I was in the washing machine again, but this time Cole’s hand kept me oriented.
It was a hard landing. I ended up facedown, and as I gasped for breath, I inhaled whatever it was I was lying in and immediately choked. I coughed into my hand and saw dust land there.
Cole was next to me, breathing hard. “You okay, Nik?”
I nodded. He helped me up to a sitting position, and I got my first look at our surroundings. My mouth dropped open.
We were on hard ground—covered in a light-brown dust—that seemed to stretch infinitely in all directions. The entire place had that too-white look, as if it were part of a filmstrip that had been overdeveloped. I turned in a complete circle, but the landscape never changed. The sky above shone blue, but again there was no source of light. No sun. The air even shimmered in the distance, as if heat were rising from the ground and distorting the image.
Max stood up and brushed himself off and then pulled a small metal object out of his pocket. He held it flat in his hand.
“So, it looks like Ouros is that way.” He pointed behind me, and I turned, squinting at the horizon. Now that I focused on that point, I could see a faint gray line, and I wondered if it could be the wall that surrounded the Common.
“Which means that Limneo is that way.” Maxwell pointed in the exact opposite direction.
“Limneo?” I said.
Max ignored me, but Cole answered. “Another Common. It’s the Greek word for lake.”
Max consulted the metal object in his hand again. “So we’re in between Ouros and Limneo. Which means that the void is out there.” He faced toward Limneo and pointed left. “And the High Court and the other three rings are that way.” He jerked his head to the right.
I searched the horizon. The only things I could make out were the faint gray lines in the directions of Ouros and Limneo. Could the Everneath be that big? So big that I couldn’t see the perimeter of the next ring?
I was about to ask Cole, but he spoke first. “We need Nikki’s tether so we know which way to go.” He was looking in the direction of the void as if he was planning on my tether pointing that way.
I’d forgotten all about the tether. I looked down at my chest, right where Cole said it was supposedly connected. “Should we be seeing it right now?” I said.