“Back!” Andrina pulled Janelle away from the rail with an iron grip. She couldn’t help but back away. Gary would change any second now. At least he’d escaped. Andrina wouldn’t kill him.
Another small splash sounded from the water. Then, a cough.
He hadn’t transformed. Janelle twisted her arm around and freed herself, then ran back to the rail.
“Don’t even think about it, sweetie.” The Tempest High Leader grabbed her elbow now, holding tight. “Ivanna…take her other arm.”
A second pair of hands took her other elbow. There was no jumping now. Janelle wasn’t sure whether to feel relieved or horrified. “Gary. Are you still down there?”
Another cough. “Yes.”
She looked down. Gary gripped the ladder on the side of the yacht as bubbles foamed around him, hair plastered to his head. He spit out some water and looked up at her. His eyes showed no trace of storm clouds. No breeze snapped through the air, unlike the time at the beach. But that didn’t make any sense.
Janelle knew why.
The ocean was waiting for her. No Tempest could transform now until she took her turn.
“She’s not going anywhere just yet,” Andrina clamped her hand down harder on Janelle’s shoulder before she could move. “Now climb up here and get dried off, before I decide to break your neck and feed you to the sharks.” She snapped her fingers at the two men, who waited in the doorway. “Take him inside and keep an eye on him.”
Gary climbed up and flopped down on the deck, defeated. The ocean gathered around him in a puddle.
“You’re not going to hurt him,” Janelle said. She could say what she wanted. There was no way they’d harm her, not if she was needed for this Operation. Or would they? She didn’t care anymore. “If you’re all for protecting Tempests, why are you talking about feeding us to sharks?”
Nobody said anything to her words. Gary stared down at the decks the two men led him away, back into the yacht.
Sickness bloomed in her stomach.
“Come inside, Janelle.” Andrina said in that fake sugary voice. She’d ignored her question. “Sometimes, you have to put your foot down. That’s the way it is when you’re a leader."
“Don’t talk to me.”
They didn’t let her go until she was back inside. Janelle burst across the carpet and back into the bedroom. Gary waited inside, wrapped in a towel and clothes stuck to his skin. She breathed a sigh of relief. They hadn’t taken him away to hurt him. If they had, she would have made those two guys very sorry.
Why was she thinking like this? Before two days ago, she’d never dreamt of hurting anybody. Had never felt such violence brewing up inside.
“You okay?” Gary dried off his hair.
Now she couldn’t face him. “I’m sorry.” Janelle fell onto the bed, pulling the covers over herself in case Andrina came after her. Her heart raced. Everything had gone wrong. Everything.
“Look, I’m sorry. It was a huge thing I asked you to do."
“It was my fault you didn’t escape,” Janelle emerged from the covers and back into the dim light. “I should have jumped before you even came out. Then you could have gotten away, too.”
Gary sat on the edge of the bed, staring down at the floor. “Don't blame yourself. A lot of things could have gone wrong with that. We're outnumbered here."
“But now what?”
Gary got off the bed. One of his joints popped. “You're supposed to be even stronger than Andrina is, if she's right about what she said about you."
“I don’t know how to use any of those powers, with the exception of breaking doors. Well, on purpose. So what good am I until I learn?”
“You can learn. It’s not that hard. I can probably show you once we’re on Alara. Do it here and we’ll wake everyone up. And Ivanna’s keeping watch. We can't go off the boat now.”
She closed her eyes and drifted for a long time. Janelle woke some time later to orange sunlight filtering into the hallway. Someone groaned from out in the living room—probably Ivanna. Sounds of waking and shuffling floated down the hall. Dread blossomed in Janelle’s insides like a poisonous flower. It was morning. They had to be close to Alara.
“Gary?” Janelle searched back and forth.
He was lying next to her, only inches away, back turned and snoring.
She slapped him on the back. “Gary!”
He tumbled off the bed as if someone had poured a bucket of ice cubes over him. “What?”
“We’re almost there. Got any great ideas?” she asked, face heating up. Hand holding was one thing, but this…if her father ever found out he’d slept in the same bed with her—let alone the same room—he’d explode.
Footsteps approached before he could answer. Janelle straightened up. She had no time to feel awkward.
Andrina clapped her hands together as she stopped near the foot of the bed. She’d changed into a black suit and combed back her wet hair. “We’ll be pulling into the Alara marina in a few minutes. Janelle, why don’t you come up front and see the island? I’m sure you’ll love it.”
The thought of spending any more time with that monster made shudders of revulsion race up and down her back, but she stood. If she wanted to escape, it was a good idea to see where she was going.
A minute later, Janelle stood in the front cabin of the yacht, standing as far as she could from Andrina.
One of the black-haired men steered them through sparkling blue water. Ahead, a conical island covered in palm trees rose from the ocean. No buildings. No roads. It was as inhabited as an ice cream shop on a cold day. Janelle scanned the coast up and down for boats she could steal or even a stretch of beach where she could write HELP in huge letters. No luck. On this side of the island, at least, the shores were rocky, jagged, and forbidding.
Her heart sank. There would be no escaping from here.
“Where is everybody?” Janelle asked despite herself.
Andrina smiled like a woman in a cleaning commercial. “Oh, we can’t have people flying over and seeing our capital, can we?”
“That’s the Tempest capital?” she asked. “It looks like that island from Cast Away.”
“There’s a cave system through the whole island. One of my pirate ancestors discovered it and used it as a haven for a while. Lots of gold piled up here over the years. Why do you think I’m so wealthy, Janelle? Think about it. Tempests made excellent pirates. Have ever since our creation hundreds of years ago.”
“Creation?” Janelle echoed. How could things get any weirder?
“Of course,” Andrina clasped her hands behind her back. “According to legend, when the Mayan civilization fell about five hundred years ago, their storm god, Huracan, was no longer having sacrifices made to him. He was forgotten and wanted to retire. So he traveled the world to find people to take over his duty. Whenever he found someone worthy of his power,”—she paused on the word worthy—“he gave them his breath, which turned them into Tempests. Huracan went after people who were close to the ocean: sailors, pirates, coastal villagers. And once he’d made enough of us, he vanished and was never seen again.”
Janelle shuddered and focused on the approaching palm trees. Sacrifices, storm gods, pirates...it was a bit too much. But what couldn’t she believe anymore? “Is that actually true?”
Andrina shrugged. “Nobody knows for sure. Everyone’s got their creation legends, you know. But I like to believe that it is.” She stuck her nose in the air. “I’m certain my ancestors—yours, too—accepted Huracan’s gift with pride. Some of the first Tempests spent their lives drowning themselves in booze because they refused to accept their new power.”
The air grew thick. She had to leave. Another minute around Andrina and she’d scream. Janelle turned to scramble out of the front cabin.
But Gary stood in the doorway. His face had turned as purple as the ring around
his eye. This had to do with his mother. She was an alcoholic.
Before Janelle could open her mouth to say anything, he stalked away.
“Gary was standing there,” she said, unable to stop herself.
Andrina rested her palms on the back of the captain’s chair. “I know. It should remind him not to go down the same path.”
Words escaped her. Andrina was a monster in more ways she could imagine. She destroyed the lives of everyone she touched, human or Tempest.
The yacht made a turn around a group of jagged rocks, and a mouth in the side of the island seemed to open up for them. A cave stretched ahead into the darkness like the throat of a rocky giant. It looked so dark. Foreboding.
The yacht’s headlamp turned on. Stalagmites hung down from the ceiling like teeth. That wasn’t much better.
Janelle looked down at the greenish water and imagined pirate gold lying at the bottom. If there was any, it would be difficult for any of the Tempests to go down and retrieve it.
The black-haired man steered around a narrow curve. Ahead, the cave opened up into a huge cavern half the size of a football field. Electric lights and huge wires hung from the ceiling. Three other boats—one another yacht and the other two speedboats—rested alongside a dock. A fishing boat waited at the end. Sparks shot up from its deck. Someone was working on it.
Janelle studied the boats. If she stole one, it would have to be a speedboat. But she'd never driven a boat before. Gary might have, at least. They might have to try that.
The yacht pulled in alongside the other boats. The other black-haired man appeared above decks and jumped to the dock to retrieve a chain. After tying it to the boat, he waved to them. It was time to disembark.
Andrina hurried over and took her arm. “Welcome home, Janelle.”
Janelle’s heart leapt into her throat. Gary reappeared from one of the rooms as Janelle made her way to the sliding door and followed Andrina outside. He took her arm but said nothing. This time, no warmth swept through her body. She could feel Gary’s anger flowing off him.
The cool air of the cave swept over her skin. Drips came from everywhere. They climbed onto the deck, followed by Ivanna and the other woman. Wherever this was, it wasn't home.
“Come on, Janelle. I need to show something to you,” Andrina said.
Janelle swallowed and watched as they neared a round tunnel at the end of the dock. She glanced at Gary, whose face had every warning sign written on it.
“What?” Janelle asked. Her heart hammered in her chest and her stomach seemed to fill with air. The last surprise had been her father’s trip to the Bahamas. One from Andrina would be worse, guaranteed. Her gut screamed at her to stop before she saw whatever was at the end of the tunnel. Something kept trying to worm into the edges of her mind. Something about the airport. It was bothering her, and she wasn't sure why.
Shadows spread across the tunnel walls as they passed under a light bulb. Andrina’s heels clicked against the concrete floor. The air smelled wet and stale as if it had never seen the outside world. Janelle shuddered. She imagined for a moment that they were headed to some underground bomb shelter and that the world was ending, and that she would have to live in these depths forever and never see the surface again. Or her father.
Andrina rounded a curve and stopped, but her grip didn’t loosen.
Before them was a steel door with a fingerprint sensor next to it, which glowed red as if an evil entity were hiding inside. Andrina pressed her finger down to it. Click. She twisted the handle and pushed the door open. “Welcome to Alara.”
The room beyond the doorway was full of sunlight which spilled in through tall glass windows. A chandelier hung from the curved ceiling, reflecting little rainbows everywhere. A giant gray Tempest spiral decorated the floor. It was as if someone had copied her mark and laid bricks in its pattern, then polished it over. Plants lined the white walls. A couple of vending machines advertised Coke and Pepsi in the corner.
Janelle’s stomach settled down a tad. Alara wasn’t as bad as she’d expected, at least. It felt almost…welcoming. But it was a deception. If she wanted to make it out of here, she needed to remember that.
Gary pressed closer to her, squinting against the bright light. It was like he was trying to brace her for something. “What do you want to show her?” he asked, his tone every bit defensive and…protective?
Andrina patted Janelle on the shoulder. “Kevin should be arriving any second now. He beat us here by half an hour.”
Kevin. The last she'd seen him--
“But he got on a flight to Flint two days ago," she said despite herself.
“You dropped your phone back at the school, Janelle. And you left so much information on it. Your voicemail and your plans to catch a flight at Orlando. Your plans to go up to Flint and stay with your friend.” Andrina spoke the last sentence slowly, stressing every word. “And of course, your address book.”
Janelle stiffened. Oh, god. That’s how she’d known everything.
As if on cue, footsteps echoed from a hallway, along with the sound of scuffling. A man in sunglasses appeared, leading a gagged, redheaded girl in front of him like some kind of prize. The same girl she'd left behind in her other life, who had won her that stuffed killer whale out of the claw machine on her last birthday.
No. No!
Andrina took a step forward and sucked in a breath. “I'm sorry, but time is short and this is necessary to make sure you do what's in our best interest. You led us right to your best friend, Leslie.”
Chapter Fifteen