Fatal Sight (Harbingers Of Death Book 2) by LeAnn Mason (book club reads .TXT) 📕

cold. And it smelled. It smelled foul. My nose wrinkled when the rank odor sharpened as I turned my attention to it, almost like I’d unlocked a new level of complexity to the vision.

I could’ve done without that little bonus.

I raised an arm to cover my nose as the consuming smell of mold and shit made me gag. I turned further, and something hit my shin, drifting in the current. I backpedaled with a muted cry that also reached my ears... and my back pressed into something solid.

Reaching my free hand to feel the surface, I almost dropped the ring that was still in my hand. As much as I was not enjoying myself, I didn’t want to lose the vision, so I slipped the ring onto a finger and spread my palm to explore the wall. It was curved, coarse, and damp.

My disgusted suspicions were confirmed. A sewer. I was in a freaking sewer.

Gross.

What happened to the old-timey corridor I’d last seen my mother in? Neither of the places I’d seen gave me geographic context though, so I needed to do some searching.

Keeping one hand against the wall of the hollow cement cylinder, I trudged my way toward where I’d heard the splash.

Maybe it would be smart to move away from something unknown in a drainage pipe, but I didn’t have that luxury. It felt like the area behind me just... wasn’t there, like the vision hadn’t loaded that part because it wasn’t relevant to the information I sought.

Trust your gut.

Yeah, yeah, I know. I’m going.

The pipe began to arc to the left after a few steps. And as I made the turn, a faint flickering light revealed itself ahead.

I squinted, relieved that my eyes were indeed working. My pace picked up, quads working to drag my calves through the sloshing water. The loud splashes echoed on the walls, and I prayed to whatever gods — even Seke — that only I heard it, that visions weren’t... interactive in some way.

Unfortunately, the vision was interactive enough that I found the end of the segment of the tunnel with my face when it clanged into a metal bar. No bigger than two inches in diameter, the vertical bar that stretched from the top of the pipe and into the water just managed to avoid flattening my nose. But I would have a nice shiner above my right eye.

I blinked the dizziness away and then felt the obstacle. There were several bars lined up in a row like a gate at the end of the drainage pipe. The bars were only about six inches apart. But, no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t seem to squeeze through them. On the other side of the gate, I could see the flickering of what looked like a candle flame.

Irritated, I huffed out a breath.

Suddenly, I was back in the motel, staring at two faces hovering over me.

“What did you see?” Gunhilde was quick to ask, her expression eager. Torgny looked... intense as he awaited my answer, dark hair curtaining his face.

I shook my head against the bedspread — when had I laid down? “I was in a sewer, but that’s all I got. That could be anywhere.”

“What do you mean that is all you got? You didn’t see your mother?”

I frowned, irritated. “No.”

“That’s not right. You should have seen your mother. The ring would have taken you to her.” Gunhilde began pacing again.

I sat up. “I mean, it may have. But I got stuck. There was a grate at the end of the tunnel. I couldn’t get past it.” I shrugged. “I guess I gave up because, the next second, I was here.”

I stared down at the ring. It was settled snugly on my middle finger where I’d slipped it in the vision. Did that mean I’d develop that shiner from impacting the metal of the grate? My hand reflexively came to prod the flesh around my possibly damaged eye.

It’s a bit tender.

“Oh. I forgot to mention that.” I looked up as Gunhilde slapped herself in the forehead softly. “I forget how little you know. Enid was so practiced when I knew her. It is your vision,” she told me. “You can control what stops you. If you think there is an obstacle, there will be an obstacle.”

“So, I just... believe that it isn’t solid, and it won’t be?” I asked, trying to understand.

Gunhilde nodded emphatically. “Because it isn’t. Not to you. It is your mind stopping you. Stop thinking you will fail.”

“Easier said than done,” I muttered.

I hadn’t consciously been thinking I’d fail, but what did I know about visions? And learning banshee abilities from a valkyrie wasn’t the surest education.

Maybe I was... afraid to see my mom. Afraid of the condition I’d see her in. The last vision, I hadn’t known who she was. Though I had felt for the abused woman, now, there was a lot more baggage on the table, and the dungeon-like start to my vision didn’t bode well.

“Go, go. Try again.” She made shooing motions with her hands.

Dutifully, I shut my eyes and curled my hand around the ring, concentrating on my mother.

I would find her. I had to.

The trickle returned, and this time, I could hear... something else. A soft wheezing almost.

“Mom?” I whispered into the dark.

I reached a hand forward and felt the columns of the gate, the swish of water against my shins. As I had the thought, the smell returned too, and then, as if blacking out in reverse, the candle flame brightened into existence.

I gripped a bar. It felt pretty solid. But I trusted my newest mentor.

It was this or never find my mom. And I wasn’t going to let anything prevent me from finding my mom. I needed her, perhaps more now than I had growing up. She was the only one who understood my powers — and knew how they’d been bound. I wasn’t going to let —

My hand drifted through the bar.

I