Immortal

The Smoky Place (Part 3)

We could see the garden outside but it was below the normal soil.

As I watched the rose plants outside, swaying in the wind, a tear found it's way down my cheek. In my own surprise, I touched it and looked at my hand in surprise.

"Don't move," Amber murmured, concentrating on doing something to me. She placed her hands over my chest and I watched as her hands began to give of a small glow.

-

She looked around, sensing a familiar prescence. One she hadn't ever met but had recognised instantly.

Everything about the place oozed power. She couldn't move but she delved deeper into Eveny's mind, trying to find the source of the memory.

It was hard. It was like sensing the ocean, an ocean of power and memories, right behind a wall of closely interlocking trees that you couldn't navigate through. Even though the ocean seemed to be raging and roaring behind the impenetrable defense of the trees.

Small slivers of memory would seep through the cracks but then would be absorbed quickly by the 'trees'.

Smart, she thought to herself. A very effective memory containment.

She tried to peer past the trees, to go deeper into Eveny's mind but she couldn't. Whoever had blocked her memories had ensured they would stay that way. Unattainable.

But...she could still catch the tiny slivers.

She stood in between the trees, waiting for a memory to pass by that would allow her to get some glimpse of Eveny.

A memory slivered out. Golden and slim, slivering like a burning ribbon, floating through the air. If she didn't catch it soon, it would put itself out.

She concentrated on linking herself to the memory-

A hand stroking down her skin. Warm and cold at the same time.

Her skin- or what appeared to be her skin- rejected the touch.

Warm words, so loving and yet so evil and dangerous, whispered into her ear by the man behind her.

She yelled and pulled awa-

She was jerked out of the memory, like the block had a mind of its own and had realized an intruder was spying. She concentrated on finding another memory. She couldn't find one.

It was like the ocean had realized and had calmed itself down, knowing she was prying. Hiding itself.

Almost like prey would do when it sensed its hunter near by.

She searched desperately again, trying to find any sign of entrance to Eveny's mind. She tried to use her powers to disguise her prescence in her mind but that only seemed to make the ocean calmer. It seemed to have stopped altogether.

Reluctantly, accepting she wouldn't be able to find anything else for sometime, she pulled out of Eveny's mind.

-

"Did you find anything?" Miguel asked.

Amber shook her head, looking slightly unsatisfied. "Not anything that made sense- given, we don't really know anything about Eveny's path," she said. I was lying on the ground, still, watching them. I didn't know exactly what Amber had done but I was pretty sure she had been inside my mind (it sounds crazy to me, too), even though I knew they were trying to help, I didn't like the thought of someone being inside my mind.