Martin’s voice was flat and wary. “This grove is wicked now.”
Lia stuffed the orb back into the pouch and withdrew her bow and nocked an arrow which she kept in place with her finger, as Martin had taught her so well. The air was full of sounds, of buzzing gnats and cawing ravens and the twitter of insects. There were no sounds from other people, but holding absolutely still, she could almost feel the muzzles of the Myriad Ones sniffing about her legs. Cautiously, patiently, she waited – watching the woods for the sign of movement, the sound of intruders. The feeling in the air clung like smoke to her skin. Biting her lip, she focused on the source of the feelings and realized, to her shock, that they were emanating from the Leering itself.
One step closer. Two steps. She ducked around a tree, keeping low to the ground. A single quail flew overhead that might have made a tasty meal, but even the thought of food brought revulsion. Fear filled the blackened grove to the brim. Sickness and disease stalked the woods. As she came closer, even the plant-life began to alter. The charred trunks of the oaks were wreathed in vines with bronzed leaves of a shape Lia had not seen before. The leaves were moist and colorful, which was strange. She touched one gently and the oil stuck to her fingers.
The mule brayed and Martin hushed it with an apple, his muscles taut as he continued to listen to the surroundings.
Lia grimaced, feeling the oily wetness on her fingertips. “I have not seen this plant before,” she warned. Bringing her pack around, she withdrew her gloves and an empty pouch. With her short knife, she cut off a small segment of leaves and stuffed them in the pouch.
“Let us depart, Lia. This is no place for the living. The dead linger here.”
“No, something is wrong with the Leering,” Lia said. Carefully, she stepped through the tangled vines that tried to grope at her and entered the clearing surrounding the boulder. The vines grew everywhere and wrapped around the base of the boulder. Martin had never seen the depth of her potential with the Medium. If she could get close enough, she might be able to stop the rock from burning. The Aldermaston would want to know as much as possible since he could not travel beyond the Abbey borders.
She crossed around to the side where her face was and stopped, fearful at what she saw. The Leering was alive, seething with power. The face had once been hers. Now it was unrecognizable as even human. The eye sockets blazed with red-hot heat, but the expression had been charred completely off. The entire face of the rock shimmered with waves of heat. She knew that if she tried to summon water from it, it would only come out as steam.
The entire boulder was pitted with cracks, as if the stone were about to burst from the force of the Medium’s power.
Is this my fault? she asked herself. In her memory, the power of the Medium had abandoned her after the fire had destroyed Almaguer and his men. She remembered it ending and feeling weightless. What was causing the Leering to behave in such a way?
Martin’s voice was worried. “Lia, come away from that stone.”
“I know what I am doing, Martin,” she said, trusting her willpower. The boulder was blackened, charred. Lia closed her eyes and reached out to it tentatively. At the Abbey, she could summon water from the Leering at the laundry. She could mix it with fire to warm it. She did not really understand how it worked, only that they responded to her thoughts, as Colvin had taught her.
She quietly willed it to stop burning so she could touch it.
It refused.
Fear bloomed in her stomach. The Leering knew she was there. It defied her.
Stop, she told it in her mind.
“Lia, come away.” The mule brayed again.
Again, it resisted her. A mewling sound filled her ears. The Myriad Ones crowded against her, drawn to the stone, to its powerful summons. They fed on the fear it exuded. Some hissed at her.
Obey me, she thought fiercely, pushing her will against it.
The rock groaned. The mewling turned into howling. A breeze blowing through the grove turned into a gust, then into a gale. Lia’s mass of hair whipped about her face along with tendrils of vines coiled around the boulder like little snakes. She held her thought firm. A sensation of illness wrenched through her, making her head spin and she nearly collapsed into the bed of oily leaves.
She heard Martin shouting, but she could not hear his words through the blast of winds. Her thoughts focused. She could see in her mind the stone’s heat quenching. Another groan, another furious storm. Dead oak branches crashed to the forest floor, unable to cling to the trunks. A memory came to her mind.
“The rains have plagued us enough. They will quit. Now.”