Gift of Fire

complaining. I was making an observation, and I do not want…Oops.” Verity stopped and looked down.
    “What’s wrong?” Jonas swung around, playing the flashlight over her.
    “I hit something with my foot.”
    “Let me see that. Looks like part of an old sword.” Jonas picked up the dark, tarnished chunk of metal. It fit into his palm as if made for it.
    “Wait!” Verity cried out as the stone corridor immediately began to give way to another kind of corridor, one that she knew existed only in her mind and Jonas’s.
    She was too late to stop the transition. Jonas was gripping the broken sword firmly, and the walls of the psychic time tunnel coalesced around them. She held her breath as reality shifted and a second reality was superimposed on the first. When she opened her eyes she was standing beside Jonas in an endless tunnel, staring at an apparition that hovered in midair in front of them.
    The image was of a grim-faced, powerfully built man who appeared to be in his late forties or early fifties. He was seated at an intricately carved wooden desk littered with ancient tomes and writing instruments. The man was dressed in a wine-colored velvet doublet and hose, and he wore a waist-length fur-trimmed cloak. Several heavily embossed rings adorned the apparition’s fingers, and the hilt of a jewel-encrusted sword was just visible under the fold of his cloak.
    There was a small black case on the desk that appeared to have been carved out of some dark, shiny stone. It was open to reveal an egg-shaped chunk of green crystal.
    The man and the desk were in a small, stone room. Behind him was a long, black, ornately carved chest. Its lid was raised, revealing a heap of gold coins and glittering jewels.
    Verity stared at the figure frozen in time. The wraith stared back at her. “Something’s wrong,” she whispered tautly. “Something’s different about this image. I’ve been in this psychic corridor with you several times now, Jonas, but I’ve never seen a phantom vision like this.”
    “Nothing’s moving, that’s what’s wrong.” Jonas took a few steps forward. “There’s no action.” The scene in front of them remained still, as if it had been rendered in marble.
    “I don’t like the green glow coming from the crystal.” Verity took a wary step backward. “There’s something really wrong here, Jonas. I’m sure of it. Why doesn’t this image move like all the others? Why aren’t we witnessing a scene of violence connected to that sword hilt you’re holding? That’s the way the time corridor always worked in the past.”
    “I don’t know what’s going on, but I’m sure it’s harmless, Verity. I’ve told you a hundred times the scenes in this corridor are just visions. They can’t hurt you.”
    “I’m not so sure about that.” Her brows came together in a sudden scowl. “Where are the ribbons? There should be ribbons.”
    Always before when she had entered the psychic corridor with Jonas there had been an immediate rush of strange, writhing ribbons. They converged on Verity as if drawn by some invisible force. It was her ability to harness those dangerous tentacles of emotion that enabled Jonas to control his psychic abilities. Without her, he could be overwhelmed by the hungry ribbons of seething emotional energy that sought to escape through him to the real world.
    “I don’t know,” Jonas said softly. He walked slowly toward the image of the man seated at the desk.
    Verity stared at the figure in the scene. “Jonas, I think his eyes are following you.”
    “Just an optical illusion.”
    “I’m not so sure. Jonas...”
    “You’re right about this vision being different in several ways, Verity. The scenes in the time corridor have always been scenes of violence connected to whatever object sends me in here. I’m still holding the sword hilt, but there’s no action, no violence.”
    “Do you think that piece of crystal on the desk is the one Digby Hazelhurst found a few years ago?” Verity asked softly.
    “It’s possible. It fits the description.” Jonas studied the frozen image for a few more minutes. Then he moved back to stand beside Verity. “It’s just not a normal corridor image.”
    She shivered. “How can you say that anything in this corridor is normal?”
    “It has its own rules and its own physical laws, you know that. You’ve been in here often enough with me. This vision doesn’t fit the rules we’ve learned. We’re not looking at a scene