The Serpent in the Stone - By Nicki Greenwood Page 0,37

worked. After endless minutes, Sara dropped into a chair beside the cot and put her face in her hands. Her mind raced in a million different directions. What now? Panic twisted through her.

“Sara.”

She bristled and blinked away tears. Ian stood in the tent doorway. She shot to her feet, irate. “What do you want?”

Entering the tent, he uncrossed his arms. The amulet dangled, spinning, from his grip.

She took it, examining the broken leather lace. “Why did you do that?”

“Don’t go out tonight. Not wearing that.”

“Why not?” She pressed a hand to Faith’s shoulder again, but her sister didn’t respond. Sara stomped her fears back. She needed a clear head. Faith needed her to have a clear head.

Ian flung a hand up. “Just don’t leave your tent. I don’t know.” He sat in the other chair at the table and frowned. “I’ve been having these nightmares. You had that thing around your neck, and you walked into this light, this—”

“Ley line,” came a hoarse whisper.

Relief washed through Sara, and she spun around to the cot. “Oh, thank God.”

Faith wedged an elbow underneath herself and propped upright. Her features tightened with pain. She clapped a hand over her belly.

Sara helped her to a sitting position. “What happened to you? Are you all right?”

“Minus a few years of my life, maybe. There’s a ley line at the dig...running from the dig site, straight down the island. Ian’s tent is sitting right on it.” Faith reached toward the cooler in the corner of Sara’s tent. “Water.”

Sara stood up, pawed in her cooler for a bottle of mineral water, then handed it over. She moved to her tent door. From the corner of her eye, she saw Ian shift to the edge of his chair as if to stop her. Nothing disturbed the stillness outside. “I don’t see or feel a thing out there.”

Faith drank down half the bottle of water before she spoke again. “You can’t. Take my word for it, it’s there.” She took her hand away from her belly and sucked in a breath as if to regain her focus.

Sara turned around. “I thought ley lines didn’t exist.”

Faith laughed without humor and took another drink. “So did I, until just now.”

“What in God’s name is a ley line?” Ian broke in.

“A band of energy,” Faith explained. “They connect ancient sites all over the earth, like an invisible spiderweb.”

A wary disbelief crossed his face. “If you can’t see or feel it, how did you know it was there?”

“She just knows,” said Sara. Faith gave her a quick, surprised look, and Sara stared back, agitation crawling like ants along her spine. Did Faith really mean to confess her abilities to Ian? She gave a minute sigh, leaving the decision to her sister.

Faith turned back to Ian. “I’m psychic. I can sense things other people can’t.” She finished off the water, then set the empty bottle on Sara’s nightstand.

Ian fixed her with a mutinous look. Sara wondered if this new development would send him packing to Unst after all, and a curious ache settled in her belly. At last, he crossed his arms and asked, “What’s this line for?”

Faith leaned forward and cradled her stomach. “I’m not sure, exactly. All I know is what I’ve read and heard. No one seems to be able to agree whether the lines were there first, or if they popped up when all the old sites were built. Churches, stone circles, castles. The lines seem to connect them. I’ve heard that ghosts use them as some kind of metaphysical highway.” To Sara, she added, “There are dozens of them on this thing. One touched me.”

Sara gaped. Her skin crawled with an imagined chill.

“I don’t know how it happened,” Faith added. “It’s the same one who’s been trying to reach me since we got here. It was angry, upset, something. It pushed me into the ley line. My skin—God, it was like a swarm of wasps. I had the ghost for a second, but then all these voices started roaring in my head—and then I passed out.” She hugged herself as though warding off the remembered sensations.

Sara toyed with the amulet in her hands, thinking of Ian’s earlier warning about wearing it and crossing into the ley line. “We’ve been here all this time, walking back and forth over this whole island, and there was nothing there. Why now?”

Faith pushed a lock of hair out of her eyes. “Beltane? The equinox was today. Who knows? Maybe they only open at