A Storm in the Making

Chapter 5--The Birdcage

Chapter Five

The Birdcage

“Storm, Storm, wake up,” Uncle demanded urgently in my ear.

Sheesh, time to get up already, I wondered, not wanting to open my eyes.

“Is she in pain?” I heard Andrew ask Uncle.

“How should I know,” Uncle hissed at Andrew.

“Yes. She is.” I heard Luke answer confidently.

As if on command, their talking about pain woke up that sleeping dragon and I could feel the burn start in my side. The warmth of the stones I lay on seemed to soothe it. Stones? Why in the world would I be laying on stones, I wondered? This had to be the weirdest dream I had ever had.

“She’s waking up,” I heard Luke pronounce with certainty.

Then suddenly the vision of the vortex crowded out every other thought. Oh my God, I thought. The waterspout!

I opened my eyes and stared up into Uncle’s worried face. “There you are,” Uncle grinned in relief. “Back from the dead.” I could feel his warm hand clasped in mine.

“We’re . . . alive?” I asked, trying to clear the cobwebs away. “How long have I been out?”

“We’re not sure,” Uncle admitted. “Our watches don’t work here. A few minutes, maybe?” He shrugged.

Andrew and Luke’s faces came into focus above me. I tried not to notice that Andrew’s eyes looked red-rimmed as if he’d been crying.

“You’ve been out for a while now,” Luke said aloud, as if he had heard my thoughts. Behind them, the most extraordinary sky outlined their worried faces. I had never seen a sky quite that color before. It didn’t look natural. Then Luke’s comment caught up to my brain.

“What? What did you say?” I asked, distracted from the puzzle of the sky’s color by what Luke had said.

 “You were thinking about how long you’d been out,” he repeated, “and, of course, the sky. Weird, isn’t it?”

“What’s going on here?” I asked them all, shifting my gaze from one to the other, and then to the weird sky behind them.

“Yeah, ain’t it cool?” Andrew blurted before Luke could answer for himself. “I wish I could read minds, like Luke.”

I shifted my eyes to Luke’s. Luke gave me a rueful smile and shrugged. “I don’t know why, but when I woke up, I could hear what everyone was thinking. It must be this place.” Then he turned to Andrew.

“And it definitely is not cool, Andrew,” he growled. “If you think I want to be subjected to anymore of your adolescent fantasies, you’ve got another think coming.”