The Haunted Way (Champions of the Crystal Book 5)

Chapter 1.3

As it turned out, Sabrina didn't get to bed before daybreak, finally managing to escape to the guest room she generally used when she stayed at Bathir. She fell into an exhausted sleep almost as soon as she crawled into the warm, soft bed, and was roused only by a vigorous shaking. "What time is it?" she slurred, throwing an arm across her face to shield her eyes from the sunlit room.

"I don't know. Still morning, I think. Wake up, Sabrina, I've got to talk to you," Ford replied. She felt the bed tilt as he sat on the edge of it.

With a groan, she removed her arm and opened her eyes, blinking at him. There was something wrong in the way he was looking at her, oddly focused as if they were in the middle of a serious conversation she couldn't remember. "What is it?"

"Do you remember, when we came home after Homeworld, you made me promise you something?"

"No," she sighed, aware of a thudding headache starting up at the back of her skull.

"Come on, Sabrina. I need you to remember."

"Are you drunk?" Sabrina sighed.

"No."

"Good. Because I'm hung over, and I just want to sleep it off. Talk to me later." She rolled over, holding her breath until the nausea the movement had induced faded.

"Sabrina, this is important, and it's urgent. I've got to go now. Homeworld thinks they've got a fix on Malvarak's current position. There was something you wanted to tell me before I went after him. What was it?"

"Malvarak!" Sabrina sat straight up, then nearly fainted as her headache exploded behind her eyes. "Oh...."

Ford made an impatient little clucking sound. "I'll get you something. Try to sit still."

She did, with her eyes closed, until he returned and pressed a glass into her hand. She drank it in one long gulp, then waited for the pain to subside. Mercifully, it began to fade almost at once. "When am I going to learn not to drink that wine of yours?" she groaned.

"Sabrina, come on. You've got about ten seconds before I decide whatever you wanted to tell me couldn't be that important!"

She caught his wrist in a firm grip. "No. It is." She took a deep breath, trying to organize her thoughts. "Did they tell you Malvarak rebuilt Sribarak's crystal matrix using Pharon crystal?"

"No!" Ford said, shocked. "How could he have? It's not—"

"Just listen to me. He was using the Pharon system as a hideout. It was the only place Mara and Homeworld could never get to him. He took Tirqwin there, to remove his brain and use it to replace the artificial intelligence he was using in Sribarak."

Ford was frowning in concentration. "That was why Father was ill, before I was born."

"Yes. Exactly. And why Scotty and I had to leave. We were contaminated too, from the rescue."

"But—you went—how?"

"It's a long story. I'll tell it to you on the way."

Ford stopped her from getting up. "You're not going, Sabrina. I'm going, and you're staying here. But I'd like to hear the whole story. It might give me an edge."

"Ford, nothing can give you an edge. Don't you get it? Think. Think about what that Pharon crystal contamination did to Tirqwin, and then think how much worse it would be for a Miahn. For a son of the Guardian, no less. Homeworld counts you as expendable; you told me that yourself. If this doesn't kill you, or make you insane, it'll certainly mean you can't come home again, for a long time if ever."