"I don't understand how this works," he said. "How can people be trapped inside this glass ball? Even if they are, how can they see anything other that what's right here around us?"
"The ball looks solid," said Zeeky. "But, it's not, really. Touch it."
Shay moved his hand toward the glassy surface. His fingers stopped as they encountered a pressure. It reminded him of the magnets that Chapelion had kept for study. Turned one direction, the magnets would pull toward one another. But, if you flipped one of the magnets and tried to force them together, they wouldn't touch. Some unseen force held them apart. The orb produced a similar sensation on his finger tips.
"There's a whole world inside this ball," said Zeeky. "In underspace, people exist as pure thought, ghosts without bodies, forever looking out at the world. Past, present and future are all visible. The villagers tell me that, even though they don't have bodies, the things they imagine become real inside the void. It's like they're gods, creating a new world with their minds." She looked up at him. "Gods don't like to be trapped. If they could get out, they'd punish Jazz."
Shay looked at the gate to Atlantis. The black rip in reality yawned like an open mouth. "If they're in underspace, can't they get out through that portal?"
"No," said Zeeky. "The goddess has trapped this sliver of underspace in the orb. It's like a loop of space folded in on itself. Until this ball is broken, they can't get out. Jazz said nothing on earth can hurt it."
"Really?" asked Shay, his hand falling to the hilt of the angel sword. "Mind if I give it a try?"
Zeeky handed him the orb. "Be my guest."
The ball was strangely heavy for something that wasn't solid. He squeezed it with both hands; it was hard as stone. Shay sat the orb on the floor and pulled out his sword, willing it to burst into flames. Skitter jerked backwards as a hot wind washed across the room.
The white-robed women around the room stepped toward him, looking highly alert. Blasphet, who had been watching attentively, said, "Have a care. I'm committed to non-violence, but my followers are zealous in defending me."
"Lucky for me I'm not planning to attack you," Shay said, as he willed the blade to white hot intensity. Smoke rose from the frayed edges of his coat sleeve. The hilt of the sword protected his hand, but the air was so hot he could barely breathe. Gritting his teeth, he took a powerful swing at the orb.
The sword bounced off. Needles of pain shot up his wrist from the force of the blow.
Feeling dizzy from holding his breath, he lowered the heat of the blade back to a dull cherry red. The air swirled around him as the temperature dropped. He frowned as he looked down at the orb. The straw around it was burning, and there was a black, glassy gouge on the earth beside it where his sword had hit. The orb wasn't even scratched.
He stamped out the straw, and then picked up the orb.
"That was my best shot," he said. "Could Skitter bite it open?"
"I'm pretty sure he can't," said Zeeky. "And if he swallowed it, it might take weeks until it, um, came out."
Shay nodded. "Maybe there's something in Atlantis that can free them. I should go. I need to chase after Jandra and the others. I mean, Jazz and the others."
"I'm coming with you," said Zeeky, uncrossing her legs and taking on a more traditional mounted position astride her saddle. "Bitterwood is probably already fighting the Atlanteans. Let's hope we find Jazz before they finish the job."
"You're right. Once she no longer needs Bitterwood and Hex, she'll kill them." He offered her the orb.
She shook her head. "This is the last part of the future they told me. They said you would carry them through the gate."
Shay frowned. If the fortune-telling ghosts had seen that he would be taking them through the gate, had they seen Jazz possessing Jandra? If so, why hadn't Zeeky warned him? All of this might have been avoided. But, he decided it was the wrong moment to confront Zeeky on this. He placed the orb into the last bag he carried, Jandra's backpack, resting it on top of her coat. He ran his finger along the silky fabric. Though it was smudged with soot from their work digging up Jazz's heart, it still had the smell of the crystal clear pool beneath the waterfall.
His heart caught in his throat at the memory.
He willed the sword to bright yellow flame once more and held it toward the portal. The void within the rainbow devoured the light, revealing nothing, not even shadows. He breathed in slowly through his nostrils, staring into the darkness. Even his bones felt cold, despite the heat of the sword.
Leaping into the unknown was the job of heroes. He was only a skinny former slave with an aching heart and unusually crisp handwriting. It was just as well he didn't know the future. Closing his eyes, he leapt. The last thing he heard before the void swallowed him was Skitter clattering at his heels.
CHAPTER THIRTY:
PARLOR TRICKS
Having been through an underspace portal before, Hex was braced for the disturbing sensation of nothingness that enveloped him as he stepped into the gate. Blasphet's description of death as feeling as if he was falling from his own body echoed the experience, though not fully. For the briefest flicker of time, Hex simply ceased to exist, and all his senses ended.
When he emerged on the other side, the first sense to return was touch. He stepped into air that was positively balmy. It was night; he stood in a well-manicured garden full of statues, male and female nudes of exquisite perfection, their skin and hair crafted from precious metals, gold and platinum and palladium. Bright pink and white flowers filled large terra-cotta pots, lending a sweet scent above the sea breeze that swirled gently around him. In the center of the garden was a fountain made of glass with a central spike taller than Hex. Water poured from a large golden disk atop the spike in an unbroken circle and fell in a shimmering column to the pool below. Goldfish that looked crafted from actual gold darted about in the softly lit pool.
Beside him, Bitterwood tilted his head upward, then higher, then higher still. They were surrounded by towers that rose until they vanished among the stars that shimmered in the cloudless sky.
When he looked down, he found Vendevorex and Jandra standing on the broad glass rim of the pool. She said, "Gentlemen, if you're done gawking at the architecture, we need to get to work. The second I start construction of the antenna, the city mind will know something is happening. We need to get you ready for the fight."
"I'm as ready as I'll ever be," said Bitterwood.
Jandra smirked. "Your thorn-tipped shafts aren't going to scratch the guards here in Atlantis. You need an upgrade. Draw an arrow."
Bitterwood frowned. Hex sensed that the hunter didn't like being ordered around so brusquely. Bitterwood was here for the same reason he was; not to fight the city, but to stay close to Jandra. He was almost certain that Jazz was the controlling personality within her. That last sliver of almost was enough to keep him from lunging out and snapping her skull between his jaws while he still had the strength. On his empty stomach, he felt every muscle in his body trembling.
Bitterwood drew an arrow from his quiver and stared at the tip, perplexed. The shaft now ended in a tiny rainbow, with an almost invisible spot of black at the point.
"Now when you draw an arrow from the quiver, it will be capped with an electromagnetic field encompassing an underspace gate only a millimeter across," Jandra explained. "This tip can carve through any matter it encounters and send it on a one way trip to the Mare Ingenii."
"Where's that?" asked Bitterwood.
"The far side of the moon. There's a city there now. If you shot Hex with that arrow, some moon man would no doubt be mystified as to why a long spaghetti-shaped strip of dragon entrails had fallen on him."