by Kate Martin
How this became my job, I’ll never know. It’s still repercussions for what happened with the boy all those years ago. If I ever get my hands on Kadiel, I will wring her delicate, bookish neck.
The boy. She still hadn’t found him. Sightings were to be included in her constant reports from the myst, but nothing ever surfaced. When she traveled to the myst personally, escorted by Oriel, she could not help but sense that something was amiss. No one spoke of the boy. Oriel’s doing? Or had he truly gained some mastery over the ability he had been born with?
The former seemed more likely.
How unfortunate that taking down an overly ambitious demon was turning out to be easier than tracking down one ill-begotten mutt of a child.
One thing at a time. I shall take care of Lillianna, that should be enough to restore my position and reputation. After that, the boy will be mine.
The door opened, slamming back against the opposite wall. Temel stood there, looking like someone had set fire to his wings. “Sir.”
Gabriel moved towards him. “What? What is it?”
“You are needed in the myst. The singers are frenzied. Oriel is waiting for you.”
“Frenzied over what?” She hurried down the familiar path to the myst, Temel close at her heels.
“I cannot say,” he said. “I have never seen them like this before.”
Through too many halls and courtyards, Gabriel walked at a pace unbecoming someone of her station. Anyone around to notice would most likely think nothing of it. The entire place had become a bustling, frantic, jumble. When she reached the edge of the myst, that silent ocean that gently licked the edges of Haven, she stopped short.
It churned and bubbled like a violent sea.
“What in The One’s holy name is going on here?”
Oriel appeared, staggering through the crowds, her wings drawn tight and her eyes wide. “It is the myst.”
“I can see that! What is making it move like that?”
“That is us. The other singers. We are moving fast, quicker than we ever have before.” Oriel was short of breath and her hands twitched. “We try to reach for the myst, to calm it, but it resists us. Too much is changing all at once.”
“What is changing?”
“There are new tendrils, new myst born. The pieces are blank, waiting to be written. A god is in the making.”
Exactly the news Gabriel had been waiting for. “Then Lillianna is ready. And so am I. We will move immediately. This will all be over soon. Just maintain the myst until that time.”
“You do not understand.”
Gabriel had been about to go, but those words stopped her. “What do I not understand?”
“It is not only that. It is much worse. Gods have been born before, we know how to deal with that that, but this…”
“What? What is it?”
Oriel turned, looking back at the myst where she spent so much of her life, then back to Gabriel. Her expression was grave, terrified, and desperate. “There are sections of the myst, whole parts, that have gone dark. They are hidden from us, coated in blackness. There are things we cannot see. Things that were once there and are now missing.”
“A side effect of this birthing?”
“I think not. Something else is at work in the myst.”
— CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE —
Bri hated lying to Alec. He really did.
Trust no one.
The words cut him still, even hours later. It was nearly dawn, and despite the nightmares that had come and come again no matter what he or Alec tried, Bri had finally felt so terrible about everything that he had begged Alec to give him some time alone. Reluctantly, Alec had agreed, and Bri had spent the next turn choking back bile, shaking and splashing his face with cold water. Finally, he had simply given up, lain down, and gone into the myst. Resisting was harder than giving in.
He hadn’t expected what he had found there.
The myst was a storm of chaos. All around, he could sense the beings who guarded its secrets scrambling and shouting. The movement stirred the normally still air, whipping cold breezes by that rendered his skin raw. Bri fled the madness, searching out a place in the myst that was left largely deserted. More than a few winged beings passed him as he ran, but not a single one spared him so much as a glance. For once, he felt truly invisible.
Gasping for air he wasn’t sure he really needed in this place, and doubled over with pain that was at the same time both physical and mental, Bri collapsed when he found a place still calm and quiet. The myst was so vast it never ceased to surprise him. The tendrils here moved about lazily, tapping against him and gliding by with their visions of early childhood days and common occurrences. A wedding, a farmer collecting his harvest, a daughter and her father purchasing a new doll. So benign. Bri let them slide in and out of his mind without resistance. He settled into those harmless scenes, losing himself in their utter normalcy. They passed in and out, a mere tickle compared to what usually assaulted him. He lay down, closing his eyes and giving in to the makeshift peace.
Then his vision went black. Then grey and blank. Then black again.
He opened his eyes in enough time to see the tendrils passing by, and reached out to them again. Black and grey. Nothingness. The grey tendrils showed him nothing and felt like nothing. As though they were new and unhampered by any sort of life. But the black ones…they stole his vision, his hearing, his senses of touch and taste and smell. Everything went dark, as if nothing existed. He groped at them, refusing to let them go before he could make sense of it. His other sense, the one that tapped into the myst and saw what it had to show him, could still detect something. Something that had once been there, but was being blocked.
These tendrils were not new, they were old. They had been tampered with.
“Bri?”
He released all the tendrils at once, hands clutching at his eyes as all his senses returned. Hands fell suddenly on his shoulders, supportive and firm. He flinched. Then the voice came again, concerned and softer than before. “Bri? It’s me. Can you hear me? It’s Kai.”
Light returned and he saw his brother crouched before him. He looked pale and tired, with dark circles under his eyes, and his arms had been bandaged tightly with white linen that was stained red in some places. Bri observed that they had never been more identical.
“Kai. Are you hurt?”
“What?” He glanced at his arms and hands, having seemingly forgotten about the numerous cuts. “No. Don’t worry about me, worry about you. What the hell happened?”
His brother’s wounds became one with the memories of the darkened visions. “The myst. It’s all wrong. It’s black, and grey, and the burnings. It’s all moving too fast.”
“I thought I was getting better at understanding all your myst talk, but I’m not following.”
“I don’t know how else to describe it. Something’s wrong. Something’s happening.” He took a good look around. Still no one else there but himself and Kai. Whatever was going on, it wasn’t concerned with the everyday happenings of ordinary people. He searched for one of the tendrils that had shown him only darkness. “Here,” he said, touching it and taking Kai’s hand, knowing Kai would see what he saw. The thick blackness rolled over them both, blotting out the world. For a moment they existed in nothingness, then it retreated with Bri’s release. “See? That’s never happened before. And it feels wrong. I can tell something should be there, but I can’t see it. It’s like it’s…been blocked.”
Kai was visibly reeling from the experience, eyes wide, releasing Bri’s hand. “That’s incredible.”
“It’s terrifying.”
“To think it got blacked out so completely. I had no idea it would work that well.”
Bri’s heart stopped a moment. “Work that well? What are you talking about?”
Kai stood, the corners of his mouth crooking upwards. Helooked… mad. “It was a hunch at the most. A hunch! I strung a few lines and runes together and figured it would do something, but
this? Ha! I’m more of a genius than I thought.”
“Kai?”
His twin swooped back to him, perching on the balls of his toes so they were face-to-face. “Bri, you have no idea how amazing this is. I can scribe labrynths that will black out the myst! If you can’t see it, I’m sure those damned singers can’t either. Probably why everything is such a mess in here.”
“But why? Why would you do that?”
“So they can’t see what I’m up to.”
A chill so cold came over him, lancing pain through Bri’s soul. Kai smiled with a malice Bri had never seen before. Bri didn’t know this person in front of him. It wasn’t his brother, not the boy he had gotten to know over the last few months. “Wh-what are you up to?”
“It’s all for us, little brother. Everything.” Kai could hardly stay still. “I do this, and I’ll have access to enough power to put everything right again.”
“Put what right?”
“Things aren’t supposed to be this way. We’re supposed to be together. Your power is a part of mine, and mine is part of yours. We’re each half of one whole. We never should have been separated. We shouldn’t be living on the streets. We belong in palaces. No one has ever been able to do what we can do. We can change the world.”
Bri’s hands were shaking. “I don’t want to change the world.”
Kai scoffed and rolled his eyes. “Of course you do! You complain all the time! I should have saved them. Why couldn’t I save them? What good is seeing the future if nothing can be done to change it? You want this, Bri. I know you do.”
Kai was a stranger. Looking into those eyes, Bri had thought they were so much like his own. He saw nothing but madness now. “Not like that. Not like what you mean.”
Kai’s eyes turned darker. “Don’t fight me on this, Bri. Don’t make me your enemy. You won’t like it if it comes to that.”
He’s threatening me. “What could you possibly do to me that’s worse than what I go through every single day of my life?”
“I don’t want to hurt you, Bri,” Kai said, shaking his head, his voice softening. “You’re my brother. I love you.”
Those words, words Bri had imagined family saying to him, sounded wrong.
“But, Bri,” Kai slid closer, their knees touching, “I’ve worked long and hard to get where I am. For both of us. I will not let you ruin it. Are you with me?”
Bri shook his head. “Kai, I—I can’t help you do this.”
Kai grabbed his hand. It was a gesture of desperation and he squeezed hard enough that Bri winced. “Think, Bri. Think carefully. Don’t dismiss me so quickly.”
“Kai, you’re hurting me.”
With a cry of rage, Kai slammed one hand to the ground. Bri felt something shift behind him, rise up with a low rumble. Stone scratched his back, dragging him to his feet. Stumbling, he glanced over his shoulder at the large stone slab that had manifested. Smooth and polished, it reminded him of the mirror that had at first terrified him, then given him hope. Terrified was the right thing to be.
Seething, Kai slammed Bri back against that wall, pinning him there with his whole body. His right hand pressed against the stone by Bri’s head, his fingers twitching, eager to scribe. Bri didn’t dare move, he barely breathed. After some careful breaths, Kai spoke again, his voice tamed. “I’m sorry, Bri. I really am. But if you’re not going to help me, then I’ll do what I have to, for your own good.”
To buy time, though he had no inkling of what he could do, Bri kept calm and began to ask questions. “Just what do you want me to do?”
“I need your blood.”
“What for?”
“To blend our powers. I need to go through the myst and come out where I intend to be.”
“You want to pass through the myst? Like the demons pass through Hell?”
“Exactly.” Kai’s excitement softened the madness.
“Where will you go?” Bri asked cautiously.
“I need something that’s in that manor you live in.”
The manor? “What?
“I don’t know if I should tell you. I’m not sure I can trust you right now.”
“The manor is huge. How will you find whatever it is you’re looking for if you don’t know where to look?”
“I have ways of finding it. I made it.”
Bri’s mind raced, scrambling for any thought that might help him. “Kai, please tell me. You know everything; it’s not fair. How can I know if I want to help you if you won’t tell me what you’re trying to do?”
Silence from his twin indicated consideration. Bri struggled to breathe and keep his gaze from wandering away from Kai’s face. He didn’t dare miss anything.
“All right,” Kai said after a time. “I’ll tell you. But if you betray me…” he let the warning trail.
“I won’t,” Bri promised, hoping he could lie just this much. “Kai, you’re stronger than me. You know that. What could I possibly do?”
“Well, that’s true. Fine. I need a shard, from a box. Your demon, Carma, stole it from my mistress, and we need it back.”
“Lillianna,” the name spilled from Bri’s lips the instant his mind reached the conclusion. “You’re working with Lillianna.”
“Very good.”
“Kai, she’s dangerous. You don’t have to do what she wants. She’s the one responsible for all this killing. Come home with me, and we’ll—”
Kai was laughing.
“Come home with you?” he said, composing himself. “Now that’s rich. No, my brother, if anything, you are coming home with me.”
“She’s a killer!”
“Don’t!” Kai slammed his fist beside Bri’s head. “Don’t talk about her. You’ve never met her, you don’t know her. She’s the one who got me off the streets. She took me in and gave me a life. I had nothing before her. Nothing. She showed me how to be strong, how to work the magic I was born with. She gave me everything. And I will do my best to pay her back, because she plans on giving me the one thing I want more than anything else in the world.”
“And what’s that?”
“You.”
“Me?”
“Yes.” Kai moved as if he would touch Bri, but then stopped. “Like I said, we’re not meant to be apart. You feel it, I know you do. We’re stronger together, and I want that strength. So, give me your blood.”
“Have you…? There were labrynths at the temple and at the burnings. Was that you?”
“Yes.”
The first tears made their way down Bri’s cheeks.
“Oh, Bri, don’t cry.” Kai’s fingers moved along the stone beside his head. “We’re so close now. Once Lillianna is a god, she’ll be able to grant me the power we need to be together forever. It will only get better from here.”
“You’re a murderer. Why would I want to be with you?”
“Because we’re—” Kai snapped his jaw shut, held his breath a moment while he calmed himself, then shook his head. “Don’t test my patience, Bri. Give me your blood. You can stay here. No one will even know you’re gone. They’ll see me and think you’re fine.”
The stone began to creep along Bri’s arms. He sank into it, as though it had softened enough to embrace him, but the edges were hard and unyielding. The cold of the myst moved in, more threatening now. He felt the tendrils lick at him, taunting and tormenting with their visions. The blackened myst came close, but did not touch. The overwhelming amount of visions shocked Bri, blurring together until he saw only flashes of Kai in front of him.
Bri shuddered. “Kai. Kai, please, you can’t leave me here.”
“Of course I can,” Kai said, his voice breathy as he pressed his forehead to Bri’s, his hands encircling his brother’s face. “Of course I can. It’s easy. It’s better this way, Bri.”
“No.” Bri felt the myst growing thicker, digging in its claws in a way he hadn’t felt since he was a child.
“Yes, yes.” Kai stroked his face, as though he could soothe the nightmare a
way rather than be its usher. “You’ll see. Once you let the myst in, it will be so simple for you. You won’t confuse visions and reality, they won’t bombard you while you sleep. And I’ll come for you when it’s time. It will be better, easier for you.”
“I’ll lose myself, Kai. I’ll lose everything. There won’t be anything for you to come and get. Please. Please let me go—”
Kai’s hand locked around his throat. “Lose yourself? Lose? You don’t know the meaning of that word, brother. You’ve never truly lost yourself. You don’t know what it feels like. To have no purpose. No birthright. No.” His voice turned darker as his fingers began to loosen their grip, turned to stroking rather than strangling. “No. You know so little of suffering, little brother.” He pressed his face to Bri’s again. “But it doesn’t matter now. I forgive you. And in my forgiveness, I am going to give you peace.”
Bri struggled to pull away, but the manifested stone at his back was as unyielding as Kai. “You don’t know what the myst will do. You don’t understand—”
“I do. I do understand. You showed me, remember? And that’s why you are going to be a good boy and cut yourself. You’re going to give me your blood.”
A blade pressed against Bri’s hand. “No.”
“Do it.”
“No.”
“Dammit, Bri! Do it, or I will do it myself!” Kai tried once again to make him take the blade, folding Bri’s fingers around it.
Through all the disorienting visions swirling about his brother’s face, Bri forced his fingers to remain limp. “Then you’ll have to do it yourself, because I won’t help you willingly.”
Silence. Then, with a scream of rage, Kai took the knife and slashed it across Bri’s shoulder and chest. The pain was exquisite, but nothing as sharp as the pain in his heart.
Immediately Kai set his mouth to the wound and began to drink. The myst pulled, responding to the change, throbbing with anticipation.
Bri shut his eyes against the tears that embodied his helplessness. I’m sorry, Alec. I should have told you the truth.
Gasping for breath, Kai lifted his head. Bri felt hands on his face again, then tasted his own blood as his brother kissed him.