The Last of the Red Hot Vampires - By Katie MacAlister Page 0,67
you do not wish for me to do so.
It's OK. I tried to put a lot more confidence into my words than I felt. I doubt if they will do anything too heinous in front of all these witnesses.
Theo moved away reluctantly, stepping back to stand with the onlookers. I bit my lip nervously, rubbing my hands together as I wondered just what this trial was going to consist of. "Er...forgive me for asking, but how on earth do you determine the purity of someone's being?"
"It's simple," the boy said, smiling a gap-toothed smile that did little to lighten my heart. He spread his hands wide, then brought them together so quickly that his movement was unseen. "You die."
The blast from his hands hit me with the force of a runaway bulldozer. I fell backward, the sound of my own terrified shriek mingled with Theo's hoarse roar ringing in my ears as I left everything I knew behind.
Chapter 15
"So this is limbo," I said, looking around. I wasn't much impressed.
"The word 'limbo' is a mortal term used by some religions to express the concept of the Akasha, something most people have difficulty understanding," the small boy next to me said as we walked down a rocky hillside. He waved his hand at the sparse landscape around us. "The Akasha is more than limbo. It is a place few visit, and from which even fewer return."
"Really? What sorts of things do people have to do to get sent here?"
The boy's face gave away no emotion. "The Akasha is a place of punishment, Portia Harding. The ultimate place of punishment. To my memory, the sovereign has granted respite from its confines to only three people."
"Only three in that many millions of years?" I shivered. "Right, so note to self - don't do anything to piss the mare off enough to be sent here."
"That would be a very wise policy to follow. If you would walk this way."
I obligingly followed him as he carefully picked a way through a rocky stretch that led to a faint path. "The last thing I remember before I found myself here was you saying I had to die. Are you implying that I'm dead?"
He tipped his head to the side for a moment, then continued walking. "Do you feel dead?"
"No. I feel annoyed." Ahead of us, in a shallow valley, a large outcropping of rock jutted out of the earth. The wind whipped around us, cutting through my clothing and stinging my flesh with tiny little whips of pain. "And cold. What are we doing here?"
"This is the site of your trial. As you implied, it is difficult for the layperson to weigh the purity of someone's being."
I stumbled over a clod of earth, quickly regaining my balance, but looking warily at the rocky outcropping as we slowly wound our way through the deserted valley floor toward it. "So you decided on a trial by endurance, is that it? If I make it to those rocks there in one piece, I pass the trial?"
To my complete surprise, the boy nodded his head. "Yes. That's it exactly."
I slid a few feet down a graveled slope, my arms cartwheeling as I struggled to maintain my balance. "You're kidding!"
"No, indeed I'm not." He stopped next to a spiky, stunted, leafless shrub, and nodded toward the outcropping. "I can take you no further. The rest of this trial you must conduct on your own. The circle of Akasha there is your goal. Good luck, Portia Harding."
The unspoken words, "You're going to need it," hung in the air, but I ignored them as I eyeballed the rocks approximately three hundred feet away. I decided a little mental support was in order, and reached out my mind to Theo. I'm not so proud I can't admit that I'm a bit frightened by this. They can't do anything to permanently harm me, can they?
The wind was all the answer I had.
Theo? Are you there?
My words evaporated into nothing. It was as if he didn't exist.
"Why can't I talk to Theo?" I asked the boy.
He seemed to know that I was referring to our mental form of communication. "Such a thing is not possible in the Akasha."
"Lovely. So, I just walk there? That's all I do?"
"Yes. Once you reach the circle of Akasha, the trial will be over."
"And I'll be sent back to the Court?" Something wasn't right here. It couldn't be this easy. Could it?