Chapters 17 & 18: Jo-Mel Of The Hunt & Duality

17

Jo-Mel slashes the arrow in two with a swift swipe of the katana, snapping its shaft just inches before the tip found its mark.

“No time for that,” she says quite calmly for someone who'd just been fired upon. “You must find and free the boy. This one is dead, but its weavings will still have your son bound.”

“You stay right where you are,” Monique Felani says with deadly seriousness. She already has another arrow nocked and aimed at Jo-Mel's head.

“I can help. If you allow it.”

“Yeah, well, I don't know you like that. Ain't done so well with strangers so far.”

Lowering the katana, Jo-Mel says, “Understood. But I'm here at Askauri's behest and you should know that the wilds of the Incata are best navigated by the wit of two women.”

Peering closer, Monie says, “I know you...”

“Yes,” Jo-Mel says. “And you know that I mean you no harm, Monique Felani.”

18

Bealz is gone. No where to be found amongst the debris scattered about when Pickle-Me-Jack's enchantment collapsed. Monie, assisted by Jo-Mel, searches frantically for her son, but can find him nowhere.

They find the pieces of the battered wooden cart that Jack had pulled through the woods, but its contents had been scattered. They even managed to find and free several creatures, some even sentient, from their bindings. Most of those still wrapped in Jack's cacooning, though, were long dead.

Finally honing in on and tracing Bealz's essence down into the ether of the void, Jo-Mel knows where they must go.

“You'll have to open another gateway,” she says to Monique.

“Why? Where's my son?”

“When the demon's illusions collapsed, it created a vortex. He fell through. He's been pulled back through to Earth.”

Monique feels a pang of uncertainty. Here she stood, in her true form. Fiercely confident, capable. Scared to death. She felt as though she wore a new body. Or better yet, the same body stuffed into the skin of another.

It was Monique who wielded the flames, shaped her heart's desire upon the forge of an unwavering force of will.

Monie just wanted to hold her son. She only wanted to stroke his hair and face and shield him away and keep him safe.

The two women confronted themselves, each staring at the other with awe and disgust.

Taking a deep breath, she turns to Jo-Mel. “Let's go,” she says, closing her eyes and envisioning home. This time, with her awakening, she sees and follows the thread of her genetic line. She's allowed access to the magics of her familial histories.

The portal opens for her without the violent eruption of brute force she'd found necessary before. This time she slid easily between worlds as she took Jo-Mel's hand and stepped through, but her cipher was slightly off.

They weren't in Chicago.