We’d won.
We’d actually won.
36
Geoffrey
I’d done as the voice had asked.
I’d pulled when I’d felt the jolt.
Things had gotten incredibly uncomfortable for a few seconds.
Then when I’d opened my eyes… she’d emerged.
Zara.
She was alone for once, lacking both her fey shadows. Her back was angled toward me as she sat on the ground, chin perched on the top of her knees as her arms held her legs to her chest. Her silvery hair fell in a tangled waterfall down her spine as she stared out over an immense body of rippling water. The sun was at that perfect angle where its beams hit just right, sending sprays of blue and green and yellow arcing across the horizon.
It hit her in such a way that she appeared to be glowing.
My heart thrummed in my chest at the simple beauty of the moment.
Fey creatures milled around off to her left. Some sprawled on the ground, others stood in small clusters. Most were wounded, but most were in various stages of repair. They hadn’t noticed me yet, for whatever reason, and while they seemed to keep the girl within their lines of sight, none seemed willing to approach her.
Something had happened here.
Something big.
Something I’d clearly missed.
But I didn’t miss him or the jeweled knife that glinted in his hand.
He kept it down by his side, carefully angled away from the fey creatures as he slunk forward on silent feet. He wasn’t dressed like an Order soldier, but he still looked very out of place in his own semblance of a dark uniform. For all his subtlety, Toren was acting pretty brash.
And he was aiming for the girl I’d tried so hard to protect.
My body twitched and it was as if I suddenly… found my body again.
I was moving, my throat working as I sprinted across the grass. I couldn’t spit her name out, couldn’t warn her of the impending danger. I could only run, sparks of magic already igniting in my hands as I tried to find some way to make it work. I was drawing attention, but the wrong kind of attention. The kind of attention that drew attention from the thing they needed to see.
Why weren’t my damn vocal cords working?
Someone rushed toward me, yelling at me to stop. Someone who was clearly stupid if they didn’t see what was about to happen. Zara lifted her head as the shadow fell across her. And she jerked forward when she caught the edge of the knife in her periphery. But it was too little, too late.
Toren was already in mid-movement, knife moving, aiming for her heart.
My magic burst forth like a wildfire, blasting from my hands…
As someone tackled me.
The God of Air. The boy from the church. His brown eyes were wild. The feeling of his restrained magic so close causing my already tenuous control to slip.
Then came the screams.
First male and guttural – fading quickly.
The God of Air whipped around, dropping me as he shifted toward the sound.
Now female and shrill.
The fire. I’d lost control. He’d made me lose control.
And she’d paid the price.
37
Zara
I’d seen the shadow and the knife.
The glitter of those damned jewels told me that at least one key member of the Order had escaped my wrath-filled flood. I’d already started drawing on my magic to stop him, to fling the general to the side and drown him where he fell.
Then something hit me.
Bright and white and red.
I remember thinking it looked like a ball of fire. But it was too hot to be fire. Too bright to be natural. Flames surrounded me as the general fell away. My magic leaped to my defense, but it was so much, too much. My skin sizzled and popped, my bones cracked, my hair and clothes burned to ash around my body. I’d never felt this much pain. Never imagined that this kind of pain was possible.
I was past thinking, past reacting. Whispers of magic twisted and swirled inside me, desperate but trapped as I couldn’t find the energy to use it. I was dying.
Help. I shouted, flinging out my thoughts as far and wide as I could.
But nothing.
I couldn’t even tell if I was on fire any more. My nerves had gone with my skin.
I was little more than a husk and a thought.
A breath away from death’s door.
And then I saw him.
How, I don’t know. Because my eyes shouldn’t still work.
But I saw. I saw the slender, scarred face. The deep scars. The bi-colored eyes.
I saw him reaching for me, flames licking up his arms as he stared first his hands, then at me in horror and disgust.
He’d done this.
He was going to kill me.
And if I went—I was taking him with me.
I flung out the last ribbons of my magic, closing my eyes as he went soaring toward the lake. Barely believing when the last dying flickers of the comforting blue of my magic died.
This was it.
Death by fire.
Geoffrey had won after all.
Gods I hurt, every inch of skin burned, seared raw. My lungs scorched. My nerve endings raw.
But I wasn’t done yet. I dragged in a harsh breath, the effort taking everything I had left in me.
Something flickered in my veins. Something completely unlike the gentle currents of my water magic. This was foreign and unwanted. More smoke and flame on top of the remains of my torn and blistered body. I wanted to rally against it, pitch it against my water. But I lacked the strength and instead allowed the ash to coat my veins like a fiery poison.
I didn’t understand.
I barely felt the double sets of knees touch down on my right and left, barely felt Ryder drop his jacket on top of me. Vaguely realized that someone was pushing their magic into me, forcing the healing process to begin as our abilities melded.
I closed my eyes.
Only for a moment, I told myself. Sinking a bit deeper into my body, shying away from my searing nerves, the desert-dry touch of my skin. I needed a few minutes where it didn’t hurt so much.
Somewhere far away I thought I heard something say…
You are worthy of fire.
But that couldn’t be possible.
Water and fire didn’t mix.
38
Zara
“…come back, Z. Please come back.”
“…go away.”
“What did she say?”
Hell. My skin felt wrong. Dry and papery. My lungs whistled as air moved through them.
That could only mean I’d survived.
“How bad is it?” I drawled, my tongue a heavy weight in my mouth.
I opened my eyes, squinting up at the green-skinned face of the female pixie-leader that helped me get to the Anisra cannon in the first place. Her ink-black eyes regarded me seriously. She smelled faintly like roses, and she lowered herself close enough to kiss.
“You know, we weren’t really all that well acquainted before, and I’m sorry if I gave you any impressions that I was into women. But I’m not. In fact, let’s say I’m not into either gender until this whole saving-the-world thing is behind me,” I muttered dryly, wincing as the skin pulled around my lips.
She full out grinned now, like, face-splitting, white teeth flashing grinned. It was blinding. And a little horrifying. Each tooth was pointed and when she opened her mouth to talk, I realized they were arranged in double rows. Like sharks. I couldn’t even quite comprehend how that worked. I slicked my tongue around the backs of my teeth in response.
“If I went for women you would certainly be high on my list. Well, maybe not in your current condition, but regardless,” she said in that same beautiful, lilting voice as before. “Alas, that’s not the case. I’m merely one of the better-trained healers in my clan. I did what I could to help your cohort here. The kelpie.” She fluttered a hand full of fingers with
extra digits.
“I assume you’re saying it didn’t work.”
“Just hang in there a little longer,” Finn muttered from somewhere over my shoulder. I vaguely registered the steady lapping of water beneath me. “If you could tell your magic to stop fighting me, it would help.” The piercings on his face shimmered in the sunlight as he finally moved into a position where I could see him. Green eyes bulged against his paper-white skin.
Memories sputtered through me. The battle. Finn falling, bleeding everywhere. Water filling the lake. Ryder flying me to safety before being called over to help with something. The shadow that fell over me. The knife.
Geoffrey.
I reached up and grabbed Finn’s arm. Or tried to anyway. I was too weak to do much but brush the hairs on his skin. A large bandage wrapped around his chest, and I could tell he was holding one of his arms awkwardly, but he looked otherwise ok. “You’re ok?”
“Sort of.” He shrugged and pulled away, his hands leaving my ribcage. I missed their warmth immediately. He toyed with his lip ring and swished his knuckles in that nervous manner of his. “Just like you probably feel: ‘sort of ok.’”
“What were you saying about my magic?”
A look I couldn’t decipher crossed his face. “Get it to quit fighting me. It burns. It’s weird.”
I remembered the sensation of ash and fire rubbing against cool and water.
Had that been real?
Had Geoffrey been real?
The words stuck in my chest. I didn’t want to speak them out loud.
Didn’t want to believe them.
“I don’t know what to do,” I admitted. “I don’t know how to heal myself.” I winced as pins and needles raced across the muscles and tendons and skin of my legs.
“Finn thinks we need the Kraken.” Ryder said, finally appearing in my line of sight.
My throat worked as real fear spiked in my gut. I didn’t know where it was right now.
Right here. The Kraken called. A tentacle slipped through the grass and a few people let out shocked gasps when it wrapped around me, strong and slimy. We’ll have you right as rain in no time, Zara. Forgive me for taking so long. It took longer than I thought to get here. Lost lakes aren’t necessarily the easiest to pinpoint. Take a deep breath.
I complied even though I was already moving.
“What the hell? Lucy, when did you get here?” exclaimed Finn from somewhere behind me before I plunged into the ice-cold water of the lake. In that moment, I felt better, every ache and every open sore — basically my entire body — instantly soothed. Like slathering buckets of aloe vera on a sunburn, but one-hundred times better.
I’m going to speed up the process considerably, little one. But I need you to tell your magic that everything is ok. It’s doing its damnest to keep you safe, so it’s locking everything else out. That’s why they weren’t able to heal you completely. That’s why you can’t heal yourself. I’ve never felt it before, but then again, no one has ever embraced two elements before. It needs to relax or you’ll never heal.
Two elements?
I barely heard it, only registering enough to reach inside myself and find my magic. Yes, the Kraken was right. It coated my skin with a second wall, protecting me from additional external damage.
Two kinds of magic.
One I knew and one I didn’t.
One a woven canvas of blue and other a flickering banner of red.
My heart clenched as I examined the shield, coaxing my magic—or was it plural now?—to loosen its ironclad grip. It argued, pleaded and pouted, but ultimately relaxed enough to let the Kraken in. Something cool and refreshing wrapped around my bones.
There we go.
The magic felt different than it had before. It had always felt smooth as alabaster, fluid in my gasp. But now it was pricklier.
As my body healed—or what I assumed was healing, it was really one giant itch—I took stock of what I’d always taken for granted. Ten fingers, ten toes. Two arms. Two legs. A head. Some other stuff in-between. My eye was finally working. My rings were still there, somehow. Probably hooked around my bones when I’d burned alive. My knife was gone but I figured Finn or Ryder would have enough presence of mind to grab it if it did indeed still exist.
I slowly tilted myself upright, already feeling immensely better. I looked down at myself, at the swiftly healing burns and bruises. He really had done his damndest to kill me if these injuries were any sign. I lifted my arm so I could see the brands. My water brand remained, loud and proud, and black as fear. Just like the symbol on Finn’s neck. Underneath it, and just as dark, was a new brand. This one a burning flame.
The symbol of Fire.
Don’t fret about that right now, little one. Focus on healing.
But what does it mean?
You passed the Trial by Fire.
And…
Never before has one of the Gods passed two different trials.
This means what? I asked.
I’m not sure.
But you’re ancient.
It’s rude to call someone old.
Can’t help what you are.
I’ll stop healing you if you don’t stop acting like a child.
All too soon the Kraken released my body, depositing it on the shores of the beautiful Wisconsin lake I’d brought back to life. I still couldn’t quite wrap my mind around that. About how I’d accomplished the impossible. I brushed the silken, sea green dress the Kraken had gifted me, wondering at the way breezed around my body. My hair had even grown back and I quickly looped it into a semblance of a braid as I looked around at the bare terrain, trying to not feel the dozens of eyes fixed on me.
A shadow crossed in front of me and I flinched before looking up into Ryder’s golden eyes. They weren’t swirling now. He must be as drained as everyone else. He pursed his lips looking me up and down and ghosted a hand over the symbols on my arm, eyebrows raising marginally as he considered what it meant.
“If you ever do anything like that again, I will kill you myself.”
“Dare you.”
Specks of amber danced in his irises. “I’m glad you’re back.”
Finn was angled off to the side. The thick bandage wrapped around his chest seemed stark and clinical against his olive skin. The pixie from earlier with the manic smile was cross-legged on the ground, elbows braced on her knees and middle fingers and thumbs connecting in a meditative stance. She was solemn now in her group of a dozen or so other pixies, and I wondered what she was thinking. Behind her stood a small herd of those half-deer people. In the center of the mass: the man who’d helped get me to the cannon in time. He caught me looking and a bright smile flashed across his face. He waved, then returned to some arrows he seemed to be repairing.
A few others I didn’t recognize stood awkwardly. I made eye contact with each one, subtly nodding my head in thanks. In response, each did something odd: touched their left index and middle fingers to their lips, before pulling them away in a slow swoosh that looked a little like a ‘u.’
Some of them turned and left after my acknowledgement.
But the pixies and deer-creatures remained.
I nibbled on my bottom lip and rubbed my chest. A question burned there. I couldn’t ignore it anymore. “Was it the general who attacked me?”
“Yes.” Joseph walked up, hands stuck in his pockets. “He’s dead.”
“Was it the fire?”
“Yes. I stopped your Hand. He arrived out of nowhere. It was weird. But he was fixated on you. He saw the general going for you when no one else did.” His jaw worked and he brushed some hair back from his eyes. Ryder was a silent shadow next to him, eyes shielded in self-loathing. “He was running toward you, trying to do something. I don’t know. Either warn you, or stop him. Maybe attack you himself. It was really confusing… and I tackled him as he…”
“Launched a ball of fire, like a dragon.” Ryder finished the sentence Joseph couldn’t quite bring himself to spit o
ut.
“It’s unclear if he was aiming at one or both of you.”
I shuffled my feet, the questions hung in the air like flies caught in spiderwebs.
“Did I kill him?”
Finn had moved closer but still kept his distance. Now that I was healed it was as if he didn’t know how to communicate with me. I was grateful, because I certainly didn’t know how to interact with him. Ryder’s hand brushed the backs of mine, refocusing his attention.
“You pulled a giant rope of water from the lake and wrapped it around him. That flung him into the lake and I… I didn’t see him resurface. One of the other fey even searched for him, but they came back emptyhanded.”
Pain sputtered through me.
I’d never know his motivations. And if Geoffrey had tried to help me…
I tried to look anywhere except at the scorched grass beside the lake. So many questions I had and so many answers I lacked. His actions had never made sense. One second, he seemed friendly and curious, the next, the Order was trying to gun me down.
I mentally reached for that connection Geoffrey had threaded between our conscious states.
Nothing but static.
Maybe he was dead.
I brushed the back of my hand over my mouth and turned to Joseph. A curious creature had landed behind him, an eagle the size of a barn with flat eyes that bored into me. Joseph stood under Its impressive breast, idly stroking Its white and black-speckled feathers. Golden claws splayed out on the ground, large grooves under them where It periodically flexed. It looked like a creature carved from wood, with hard angles and too-smooth feathers, as if It had gained life from the top of a totem pole and decided to take flight.
I approached the oddity, not an ounce of fear in my step.
Joseph smiled and lifted his eyebrows, moving aside so I could maneuver under its beak. This must be the Great Beast of Air. The eagle clicked its beak a few times and bowed, low enough for me to touch the feathers on its face while looking it straight in the eye. Its flat gaze was weirdly unnerving, so unlike the complexity of emotion that I always saw swirling in the Kraken’s gaze.
Walk on Water Page 29