Memory's Door (A Well Spring Novel) (42 page)

She dropped to her knees and took Brandon’s arms. “Talk to me.”

A voice she didn’t recognize rasped out of his mouth. “It probably looks worse than it is.”

“Brandon, no.”

He gave her a weak smile and closed his eyes. “I’ll live.”

Maybe he would. But this was about more than his life. Was his throat not as damaged as it looked? And while Brandon might sing again, she somehow knew his voice would never be the same. She glanced up at Tristan and the angel’s eyes confirmed it. Tears spilled onto her cheeks and she held Brandon’s hand tight.

“We need to get you out of here.”

FIFTY-FIVE

M
ARCUS SAT WITH
C
ARSON IN HIS OFFICE
,
NEITHER OF
them speaking. Tristan had left after instructing Marcus to call on the Spirit to be taken to Well Spring when he was done talking to the radio host but told him there was no hurry. That he should take as much time as was needed with the host.

Carson stared out the window at the LA skyline, his face still wet from the tears that had streamed down his cheeks a few minutes earlier. Marcus held his tongue. He expected a man with Carson’s ability to speak would speak when ready, but not before.

“That wasn’t the show I was expecting.” Carson massaged his knuckles. His voice grew soft. “I’ve been a fool. I allowed myself to be made into a god. Set up to lead people on the crooked and wide path.”

He sniffed out a disgusted laugh. “I started the race well. Back then I talked a balanced mix of justice and grace.” He dropped his face to his hands and rubbed his eyes. “I can’t point to the moment we started sliding down the icy slope. If I could, I might have stopped it. Where do I go from here?”

“Jesus longs to restore you.”

“And how do I forgive myself? Let the past go?”

“That is a choice only you can make.” An image of his door of memories flashed into Marcus’s mind. “And the choice is this: Will you believe that God wants you not to remember the past events
and pay no attention to things of old? Will you choose to believe it when he says, ‘Look, I am about to do something new; even now it is coming. Do you not see it?’ Will you hold on to his statement that he will make a way in the wilderness, rivers in the desert?”

Carson sighed. “Isaiah 43:18–19. I’ve quoted those verses many times.”

“My assessment of your situation is the moment has come to embrace the verse with a liberal dose of belief. Not here.” Marcus pointed to Carson’s head, then his heart. “But here.”

Carson laughed, tears forming again in the corners of his eyes. “Do you talk to everyone like that, or just people you’re barely beginning to like?”

“Only those I’m giving strong consideration to liking.”

Carson laughed again. “I know you need to go. Any final thoughts?”

“Might I suggest you give serious deliberation to at some point during the next few months coming to join the Warriors Riding at a small ranch in Colorado called Well Spring.”

“After what I tried to do to you?” Carson shook his head. “You can’t be serious.”

Marcus slipped his card onto the conference room table and pushed it toward Carson. “We would be honored if you choose to come someday.”

Late that night Reece, Dana, Brandon, Doug, and Marcus sat in the family room at Well Spring and celebrated their victories. They talked about Marcus’s conversation with Kat and how it freed him, about his experience with Carson in the studio and how what he had broken there had broken Zennon’s hold on Reece, Brandon, and her in the spiritual realm. They heard what happened when Marcus went through the door of his memories. And talked about Reece’s,
Brandon’s, and her battle with Zennon and the other demons and how Tristan, Jotham, and Orson had warred for them.

But while part of her reveled in what they’d done and the triumph Jesus had brought them, another part couldn’t get Brandon out of her mind. Would he make it without being able to sing? Once again, the enemy had dealt a devastating blow to one of the Warriors. Brandon was the Song. How could he be anything else? How would he live without his music?

He didn’t say much as they talked. How could he? The gash across his throat would take time to heal, if it healed at all. The doctor who had worked on him in the emergency room at St. Vincent Hospital in Buena Vista earlier in the day said he would keep his voice but gave little hope Brandon would ever sing again like he once did. Ever sing at all. His voice at this point was only a whisper, and it was probably painful to talk.

Dana went to sleep that night trying to accept what he had done for her. In the morning she would talk to him. And say the things that needed to be said.

FIFTY-SIX

T
HE NEXT MORNING AFTER TAKING A HOT SHOWER AND
spending a half hour alone down by the river, Dana strolled up to Piñon Bothy—the cabin Brandon stayed in last night—and knocked on the door. He opened the door a few seconds later and stood in the door frame, a look of surprise on his face.

“How is your throat?”

“I’ll be okay.” His whisper was a bit louder than the night before, and it gave her hope.

“Will you join me down at the listening post?”

He smiled, nodded, grabbed a coat off his bed, then stepped outside. They didn’t speak till they’d reached the listening post and settled into chairs on the edge of the patio overlooking the river.

“I suppose you know what I want to talk about.”

“Maybe.” Brandon smiled.

“I think you know. Because you know me. Better than anyone.” She immediately regretted the admission and then a moment later didn’t. It was true. He did know her better than anyone else and it was nice to be known.

“You want to talk about what happened during the battle?”

“Sure.”

Would she get used to Brandon’s new voice? Before, so smooth, now little more than a rasp, like he’d eaten sandpaper for breakfast,
lunch, dinner, and midnight snacks. Yes, she would get used to it because with every syllable it would remind her of what he’d done for her. And that made his voice more beautiful than ever.

“What you did . . .” She couldn’t say the words.

“You would have done the same.”

Would she have? Dana watched the leaves on the aspen trees starting to bud, their green shoots speaking of new life to come.

“Did you know what would happen to you?”

Brandon stared at her. “In that moment time slowed, and yes, somehow I knew what might happen.”

“But you did it anyway.”

He leaned forward, elbows on his knees, and nodded.

“Was it worth it? Saving me? Knowing what you know now about your voice?” What was she asking for? For him to tell her he loved her again?
Maybe.
She chided herself for allowing the flame deep inside to flicker to life. Of course she’d known it had never completely gone out.

Over the past year she’d figured out how to frequently douse it with water. But like those birthday candles that stayed lit no matter how hard you blew, whatever emotions she still carried for Brandon simply wouldn’t die. Dana reached out, put her hand on top of his, and held it there too long before pulling it away. “I don’t know how to thank you without it sounding lame.”

“Yes, I would do it again. I knew in that moment that I had to choose. My life or yours.”

“Why did you choose mine?”

“You know why.”

She did. The only sound for the next five minutes was the rush of the river and the wind through the trees.

“Another part of the prophecy comes true,” Brandon finally said.

“What do you mean?”

“‘And for one, death will come before the appointed time.’”

“The death of your career?”

“It’s better than the alternative.” Brandon picked up a tiny
pebble and rolled it between his fingers. “I always thought the part of the prophecy about one of us dying was literal.”

“In some ways this is worse.” In that moment Dana admitted how much she loved Brandon’s music—how much she had missed it after they ended their engagement. “It will be hard not hearing new songs from you.”

He let out a scratchy laugh. “Like I just said, I’m not dying. I can still write songs—it’s just not going to work to sing them like I used to.”

“That’s the best part—hearing your voice. No one sings . . .” She hesitated. Should she be that blunt? “No one sang like you.”

He didn’t respond but he didn’t need to. She glanced at him and spoke the words she’d considered since they sat down. “You’ve asked me to have coffee with you six times over the past year.”

He nodded.

She leaned closer to him. “I’m told seven is the perfect number.”

“I’ve heard that too.” He smiled at her, his eyes bright.

They lapsed back into silence, but now they shared it and it felt so right. She didn’t worry about what would happen with the two of them in the future. There was only this moment and she would live in it fully and let the days come as they may.

Brandon stood and stepped to the edge of the patio, hands in his back pockets, the sun framing his body and hair. “Does it frighten you to realize how close you came to dying?”

“Not anymore. I’ve seen too much. Think of the field of doors. Our gates are gone in a breath. We are such glorious flowers that fade from this earth so quickly. Lush grass that withers with one pass of the sun.

“If my door crumbles early, it’s nothing in the scope of eternity. And I choose to believe I’m indestructible till my time has come.” She stood and stepped next to Brandon. “What about you?”

“We’re dead already if we’re in Christ. But there is a Life inside me, a new being that is immortal and can never be destroyed.” He turned to her and laughed, a choking, raspy laugh, but one filled
with joy. “You know what was going through my mind after I dove in front of you and lay with my throat spilling blood into the mud? ‘He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain that which he cannot lose.’”

“Jim Elliot.”

“You impress me yet again,” Brandon said.

“No greater love than to lay your life down for a friend.”

“We have seen the unspeakable, Dana. We’re four ordinary people who have seen far beyond the extraordinary. And maybe this is what you’re feeling too. That those glories of eternity draw me deeper into the here and now and at the same time deeper into the life to come. I’m looking forward to going home.”

Brandon turned and pointed toward the main Well Spring cabin. “Ready?”

“Yes.”

“Can I ask you something?” Brandon said as they ambled up the path of white stones.

Dana nodded.

“Was what Zennon said true? Have you ever had thoughts about your boss?”

Dana laughed. “Not for an instant. Zennon was grasping for anything. Trying to put thoughts in your head maybe. I don’t know.” She paused. Should she say it? “There’s only one person I’ve thought of from time to time lately.”

Thankfully he didn’t ask who it was, but that was only because he didn’t have to. She wouldn’t have answered if he asked. She’d already said more than enough.

FIFTY-SEVEN

“W
HERE DO WE GO FROM HERE
?” D
ANA SAID
.

“Home. Bed,” Brandon rasped. “Sleep for nine days. Repeat.”

Reece smiled as they all sat around the fire pit for a few more minutes before they headed back to Seattle. It wasn’t a bad plan, and certainly one he could support. They’d all earned it. But first they needed to do a final debrief on their battle in the heavens.

“My friends, my fellow Warriors, the spirit of religion is still out there. Our victory over him was major, but it was one battle in a larger war.”

“There is more than one spirit of religion?” Brandon said.

“Many.”

“So what will be our strategy as we venture on?” Marcus asked.

“It might sound strange, but the answer came from both Zennon and Carson Tanner during the time Brandon was on his show.”

“And that is?” Dana asked.

“We continue to train. We continue to raise up other warriors here at Well Spring. We equip others to take the message of freedom to those around them. Here in the US, and around the globe.”

Marcus smiled. “I know of a new ally I believe can become a significant warrior on our behalf.”

“Who is that, Professor?” Doug said.

“Might I read you something before I reveal who it is?”

“Of course.”

“I received an e-mail while we were in Buena Vista at the hospital with Brandon. It is titled ‘Reminders for True Life.’” Marcus pulled out his cell phone and began to read. “When you speak, speak words of truth and life and love. All around you are parched souls longing for the living water of the Holy Spirit, and your words can guide them to the place where the water flows.

“Your body is a temple. Worship him through the way you care for it. Offer it as a living sacrifice that you might use it to advance his kingdom in great measure.

“Grow in wholeness—let him into your deepest wounds and fully surrender to his lordship and you will find holiness and will throw off the chains the world and the enemy try to entangle you in.

“Seek the pleasures of this age as shadows, as a foretaste to set your mind on the age to come where we will delight in his gifts in full measure and reign with him in eternity.