In the snap-of-a-finger, we were both on our feet and searching. But I couldn’t see her anywhere; the only thing in sight was the grey stone castle, the tall-treed forest, and the haunting…Water Faerie filled lake.
“Oh my word,” I breathed.
Alex followed my gaze and his jaw nearly hit the ground.
Across the dark water, the Water Faeries floated. The sight would have been alluring—they looked like ballerinas dancing. But knowing what they really were, and what they could do, the sight only made a chill slither down my back.
“They can’t come up here?” I asked. “Right?”
He nodded, but his bright green eyes were still locked on the water. “I’ve never seen so many of them up here before, especially when no one has summoned them.”
As I watched the Water Faeries swim around, a thought abruptly smacked me in the head. “Wait. What if my mom’s still in there?” And then I was running toward the lake, my brain too irrational to process the consequences if I stepped in.
Luckily Alex grabbed me, and pulled me back.
“Are you freaking crazy!” he exclaimed, shaking me by the shoulders, with a look of what could only be described as terrified. “You can’t go in there.”
It took my brain a second to grasp the severity of the situation I had just about gotten myself into. “I’m sorry, but what if she’s in there?”
His harsh expression slipped to a semi-sympathetic one. “If she is, then there’s nothing we can do about it.”
“We can go back,” I said, my tone razor sharp. “We have to save her.”
He shook his head. “There’s no way we’re going back there after what happened. Now that they know something’s different about you, they’re going to be all over you if you even step foot in their world again.”
“So what.” I was trying with all my might to wiggle my arm free from his grasp. “I don’t care. How do expect me to just let her stay down there after I saw how horrible of a place it is.” I could feel the tears stinging at my eyes. “Let me go!”
“No,” he told me, just standing there, holding on to my arm, my yanking not even fazing him the slightest bit.
“Let me go,” I growled.
He shook his head, tightening his grip. “You’re not thinking clearly right now.”
I stared him down with a determined look. “You have to let me go. You don’t need to protect me anymore now that the star’s power is probably not going to save the world.”
He stared at me with this strangest look. “I think you—”
Then we heard it. An earsplitting bang that rocketed through air.
“What the heck was that?” I asked, glancing around at the trees.
Alex looked over at the castle, and then at the ground. I followed his gaze and saw what he was looking at. Footprints, printed across the mud, leading toward the castle.
We took off, tromping through the muddy grass, and running up the hill, until we reached the door to the castle. Alex seemed a little uneasy as he turned the doorknob and creaked the door open. The stale air immediately surrounded us.
“Does anyone live here?” I whispered as we stepped inside.
He shook his head and dropped his hand from the doorknob.
It looked as if no one had been inside the castle for ages. The banister that guided the stairs had a thick layer of dust on it and cobwebs ornamented the ceiling like a haunted house on Halloween.
Alex went to the bottom of the stairs and glanced up. Another bang shattered the air and his gaze darted down the hall, where the noise had come from.
“What if it’s not my mom?” I whispered.
He held up a finger and then crept down the hall. I stayed behind him, keeping my footsteps light. There was another loud noise that sounding like glass being shattered, and then I saw her.
She was in the room where my soul had been detached; the room with the stone fireplace and tiled floor. She was standing in the midst of a pile of broken glass, her bare feet, I’m sure, getting cut by the sharp edges.
“Mom,” I said softly as I stepped cautiously into the room.
She’d been staring at the broken glass, but blinked up at me when I said her name. Any acknowledgment she had of me was gone, and I could see it in her bright blue eyes that she, again, did not know who I was. She grabbed a vase from off a nearby desk and threw