Enflame (Insight #6)(37)

“Who? Where?” I stated flatly, prepared to undo whatever damage had just happened.

“She’ll be fine. When we get this spell over with, I’ll go back and find another way.”

A warm rush of air that I did not create whooshed by me, producing both Landen and Phoenix.

“Begin,” Landen demanded, keeping his stance between Phoenix and Skylynn.

Skylynn turned. As she glanced at the ground, a pentagram made of fire appeared. She knelt before it. Landen glanced back at me as he moved to the side of the pentagram. I saw Clarissa nod at him. I didn’t have time to question him as to what he was doing. Phoenix mirrored him on the other side of the burning mark, and in that instant they were still. I wasn’t a fool; the three of them were gone.

“Look at me, Willow,” Clarissa said firmly. “You need to go into The Realm.”

“I don’t know how,” I muttered, frantically looking over my shoulder at Landen.

“Willow,” Clarissa urged, turning my head, “focus. How did you get in last time?”

“Per—Perodine. She opened some kind of door using energy.”

“Okay. This is just like when you move your soul. You remember where you first appeared in The Realm? Go there now.”

Nervously, I shook my head no. I didn’t want to do this wrong—to be stuck there alone.

“Willow,” she said sternly. Her hands fell to my shoulders, and an intense calm swarmed through me. I was inches from a deep sleep. “Go now.”

On her command, my eyes drifted closed, and I remembered the field of orange blades of grass and the dark sky.

“Look at me now,” she whispered proudly.

Slowly, I opened my eyes to see The Realm all around me.

Clarissa looked so different now. Before, I didn’t focus on her, but now I could see every flawless feature. It was like her image was wrapped in silk; she was warm, inviting – yet dangerously deadly at the same time. Her short, dark hair perfectly framed her pale green eyes, which seemed to glow.

She pushed her hands into her black pea coat as she smiled slightly.

“Let it out.”

“What?” I asked, mystified as I tried to pick one of the millions of questions I wanted to ask her first.

“Let every emotion out. Right here. Right now.”

“No way,” I said with a cringe. I remembered what Nana said, that it would be twice as hard to gain control next time.

“This is The Realm. Your soul, not your body. Your control is locked in place where you stand, but if you do not release right now, you will lose that control.”

I tried to reason if what she was saying was true by judging her with my insights.

“Now,” she commanded.

Even if I wasn’t sure, I had no choice. The fierce jealousy I felt caused the wind to whisk violently by, the anger I had exploded into thunder, and the grief I had made the drops of rain begin to fall.

A massive black umbrella appeared in Clarissa’s hand, shielding us both. The sly grin she gave me made me smile. The night vanished, and the sun beamed through the rain.

“That’s all you got?” she taunted, trying to hold in a grin.

A combination of every hopeless and joyful emotion exploded around me, causing snow to fall with the rain, leaves to dance with the wind, and lightning to crash within the rays of sun. It was remarkable.

Within minutes I was so distracted by the different elements of weather that I didn’t feel the emotions anymore. I understood the weather’s refection of life. In every life, the sun will shine, the rain will fall, the coldest winters are followed by the warmest summers, there will be the death of autumn, the birth of spring in everything we do, and everything we are. Understanding that the chaos of life was natural made experiencing it as it was so much easier.

With my new calm, The Realm returned to its odd base point of a distant stormy sky.

“What happened to you?” I asked tenderly.

“I’m at peace. I promise.”

“How can you be at peace here?”

“I’m at peace because I do not fear my existence.”

“Landen said that you are ready to become a Witness, you just have to make the choice – but Dane isn’t.”

Her cool stare confirmed my statement.

“You’re not at peace,” I countered. “How do we fix this?”

“Listen, Willow. Whether or not I become a Witness or follow Dane to the life of the damned, I will be at peace because I am with him. I am his light, and he is my balance.”

“Where is he? We can’t let that happen.”

“You can’t stop what will be. Only he can.”

“I’m not going to stand by either,” I argued.

“The only way out of this is to follow your own path, unweave the spell. When you fight each other’s battles, you stop progress, time.”

My frustration exploded into a pounding thunder all around us.

“I’m so lost. I don’t understand. You’re dead, we could lose Dane, Landen is a different person. I don’t know what to do. I thought finding Madison would end this, but from what I’m picking up here and there, I think I’ve doomed her—all of them. Time has stopped because I have no plan. I have no idea what to do right now.”

“I know it has stopped, and I know you will resume it.”