Remember More

Chapter 28

REMEMBER MORE

CHAPTER 28

Water crashed down all around her. It rushed in at Yan and engulfed her, enveloping her completely in its power and icy coldness.

Even in the dark and she couldn't see a thing, she could tell that without the key in its place, the entire chamber, the room and everything in it was collapsing, folding in upon itself, being reduced to just so much water again now that the power had been turned off and nothing was sustaining it any longer. In her mind, she also knew that if this should happen inside the room, then everything outside the room, the maze, the tunnels, the walls and the cavern and all that it held must suffer the same watery fate as well.

Someone's face drew near. Lips were planted down on hers.

John!

He blew a huge breath into her mouth and forced it down and deep into her lungs.

Her eyes widened. She saw stars.

Hey, wait a minute! That wasn't air he blew into her mouth, it was…qi…! But qi wasn't air, how…?

He swept her up in his arms.

Water rushed by her. That's all she could tell. Without light and only the noise of a collapsing cavern in her ears, all Yan could sense was that she was moving through the water and moving through it quickly. It hit her in the head and her face in torrents and with pressure. She scrunched her eyes up against it. She turned her face into the chest of her protector and hid herself away from the onslaught.

Yan felt herself slipping away. Things began to go foggy. John's mouth seemed to be on hers all the time, blowing qi into it, and then again, and then again after that.

She couldn't tell how long it took, or did she pass out completely? But the next thing she knew, they were back above the water, having sliced through its surface amid splashing and spray, launched into the sky like missiles from a submarine.

Yan drew in real oxygen into her lungs in what seemed like a million years and she smiled at the release of the pressure in her chest. Her brain came back on line and she blinked her eyes. She coughed. She scanned about her.

They were zipping through the air, a hundred feet above the ocean and racing atop the waves, shooting for the beach back on the main island and the harbour from which they had started their journey earlier this afternoon.

There were people on the beach, milling about and also others in boats, in the water, but John didn't care. With Yan in his arms, he made land in just a few heartbeats, soaring over the top of their heads, carving out a graceful arc near the end and then alighting gently on the sand. The people on the shore there gawked at them as they touched ground. A crowd was gathering, but it kept back at a distance, making room, forming a circle around the two that had come dropping out of the clear evening sky like angels.

John eased her down so Yan could lie down on her back, but she shook her head and came to sit up instead. She held out her wrists, still swollen and black and blue beyond recognition. She winced for the pain whenever anything touched them.

John reached out for her forearms. "I'm so sorry, Yan."

She nodded, but her brows were still tied up in a knot.

John took up her left wrist, now swollen to the size of a baguette. He began feeding his qi into it.

"Ow!" Yan drew her arm away. She shook her head. "No, not like that…"

Yan grit her teeth together and shut her eyes. She took a moment to steady herself. She breathed out.

Turning to John, she instructed him to sit down behind her and gather himself into a sitting, lotus position. She had him place his hands on her back, palms on her shoulder blades. She closed her eyes and breathed out again. "Now."