When Lightning Strikes

g white shower in its wake.

A sign, Viloula thought with a relieved sigh. She had chosen the right place.

"Killian, build us a fire," she said, spreading her coat out on the ground. "Lainie, you sit here."

Watching Viloula carefully, saying nothing, Lainie stepped over a pile of rocks and sat down on the coat. Within moments, Killian had a fire going, and he and Lainie were seated beside it.

Viloula placed the jar on a flat rock and stood back, studying it. Firelight caught the glass and spun through it in a kaleidoscope of color, turning the contents into a glittering pile that resembled crushed copper.

All Viloula's life, she'd prepared for a moment like this, waited for it. She'd believed?always believed?in the infinite possibilities of the universe. Her mama, the great obeah healer, Genvieve, had whispered in Viloula's tiny ears of the impossible and the improb-

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able. She had grown up knowing that someday she would be touched by the impossible, would taste its sweetness, be touched by its hot magic.

The moment was here; she could feel it in every quickened beat of her heart. And she was afraid.

She stared down at the bottle. Years ago, she'd gotten it from an old Indian, a blind man named Pa-lo-wah-ti who'd told her that someday she would need it. In it, he said, she would find the visionary answer to a great question.

She reached for the bottle, not surprised to find that her hands were shaking. Curling her fingers around the cold glass, she wrenched off the cork top and swallowed the drug, washing it down quickly with water from her canteen.

"Viloula!" Alaina called out. "What are you doing?"

The reaction was immediate. Viloula's knees melted, her shoulders rounded. Slowly, feeling every motion, she crumpled to her knees.

"Vi?"

She heard Alaina's high-pitched, frightened voice, but it seemed to come at her from a million miles away. She tried to smile, but her lips were heavy, uncontrollable, and her mouth was so dry, she couldn't speak. Her arms were deadweights pinned to her side. She felt the powdery brush of dirt beneath her fingertips.

How long ago had she taken the drug? She couldn't be sure; time seemed to be spiraling away from her. She glanced down, and the ground seemed alternately to be too close, then too far away to focus on. Below, glistening with firelight, lay the discarded bottle. It looked fragile and unimportant without the inner magic of the narcotic. A hollow vessel of clear glass.

Tiny rocks bit into her knees. She felt each individual pebble, each twig, as a spear of fire through her joints

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and up into her thighs. Beside her, the fire danced and writhed, sent rainbow streamers into the dark sky. She tilted her chin to watch the dazzling display. Color exploded across the sky, gushed up from the trees, encompassed her, overwhelmed her. A shooting star sped across the heavens in a flow of showering sparks. It was close, so close she could touch it, ride it. ...

Back, back, back, she leaned, until she lay sprawled in the dirt, arms spread.

A face appeared above her, a pale blob of color against the dark sky. "Vi?" The word?was it her name??was deep and vibrating, drawn out to an impossible length.

Alaina.

Viloula blinked, tried to wet her lips enough to speak. She wanted to reach out, to touch Alaina's face, but before she could move, the ground vanished, and suddenly she was falling, spilling through an endless, lightless void. It was a magical, dizzying sensation that left her laughing and breathless. Stars sped past her like fireflies, caressing her face with light and warmth.

Then she was floating, her body riding an invisible wave of air. Back and forth, back and forth. She closed her eyes, released a heavy breath, and felt as if she were dissolving, melting into the air itself, as if she were a feather, or less, nothing at all. ...

The vision hit her like a crack to the jaw, wrenching the breath from her lungs. She gasped, tried to reach out, but she had no hands, no arms. It was just a sound at first, a booming, thunderous echo of gunfire.

Killian. The name exploded in her mind, sent panic spiraling through her blood. She was suddenly hot, suffocatingly hot. She felt the prickle of sweat on her brow. Her heart beat so fast, she couldn't catch her breath.

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Run! Run! She tried to scream the warning, but her throat was so dry, she couldn't, or she had no throat, or no memory of how to speak. She didn't know, couldn't be sure. Everything was shifting in on itself, moving. The world was a kaleidoscope of blasting color and deafening sounds.

She thrashed from side to side, not wanting to see any more. A harsh, desperate whimper pushed past her lips.