Remembering (The Starlight Chronicles Book 4)

by C. S. Johnson

  “I almost feel bad for her,” I admitted. That was uncomfortable, I thought.

  Aleia smiled. “Compassion looks good on you.”

  “Let’s hope it helps my fighting skills,” I said. “Because we’re about to land.”

  The wooden docks clogged beneath my feet as we landed, but, awkward or not, I was determined to hit the ground running.

  Starry Knight and Maia were facing off at the end of the marina. I could see the small dome of Lakeview Observatory in the distance as lightning and arrows of light flashed through the sky, almost like a very poorly choreographed fireworks show.

  Maia unleashed a full wall of energy, crying out to celebrate her horrible and destructive power. “You shall not beat me!”

  The rippled lightning coursed through the air, sending Elysian and Starry Knight both reeling back, while Aleia stumbled and I felt my steps falter.

  Starry Knight recovered more quickly, as Elysian needed to get his body untangled.

  Maia stalled. “You took Orpheus away from me. I’ll destroy you for what you did.”

  “We didn’t take Orpheus away,” Starry Knight argued back. “He was purified by fire. He’s still alive.”

  “Don’t you see? It doesn’t matter!” Maia cried out defiantly. And for the first time, I thought I could see a glimmer of tears in her eyes.

  I came up to them slowly, wanting to investigate.

  “Orpheus promised me an everlasting life where he would always be by my side.”

  “I’m sorry that you believed him,” Starry Knight said, her voice surprisingly soft. She took a tentative step closer to Maia and lowered her bow.

  It was easy to see Maia as an enemy, I thought. It was hard to see her as Starry Knight’s sister.

  But that was what I knew Starry Knight was thinking. Compassion and sadness were driving the deepest kind of division into her heart. I could see it. Torn by duty and love—that was where someone like Starry Knight would stumble.

  Maia finally put her face in her hands and wept. Starry Knight’s bow dropped, then she walked forward and drew her sister into a hug.

  Maybe we can purify her, I thought, recalling how Orpheus had been changed. Maybe Maia could be transformed, too. My heart swelled with marvel at the thought. Maybe that was enough.

  I turned to Aleia to ask her, when panic suddenly laced through me.

  Maia’s weeping turned into laughter as her power erupted in blinding strokes.

  My eyes squeezed shut at the blast, but when I looked up, I saw Starry Knight had crumpled onto the ground.

  “Starry Knight!” I hurried forward.

  “That was cruel, Maia,” Starry Knight said through gritted teeth. She pulled herself up onto her elbows.

  “Kid,” Elysian called, “move!”

  Before I could ask why, I found myself in Maia’s grip. “Hey!” I sputtered, before my air supply was cut short.

  She laughed as she grabbed me by the throat. “If you think that was cruel, sister, you’ll really hate this.”

  I choked and gasped, barely managing to get my sword out. I slashed at her, but only managed to hack at her messy, bluish fro. Fear swarmed me as she grasped onto me.

  Was this the end?

  Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Aleia and Elysian rush toward us; Maia easily sent them flying back with an impressive amount of power.

  “You’ll suffer greatly. Just as Orpheus did,” Maia promised me, a blue flame dancing in her hand.

  I said nothing, barely squirming anymore as I remained unable to breathe. My eyes felt their sight slip away into darkness as I wondered if I would suffocate first.

  And then, all at once, she dropped me.

  I gulped air down into my shrunken lungs, cautiously rejoicing as my body regaining its various functions. A glimmer of light sparked above me, and I squinted up at Maia’s slumped form.

  An arrow of light stuck out through her chest.

  Starry Knight had attacked her from behind, smashing an arrow through her just under the collarbone. It looked painful. But when I looked up at her face, I was surprised to see Maia was grinning.

  “You didn’t like that, did you?” Starry Knight asked calmly.

  My fingers grappled around on the ground for my sword, but were unable to grip onto it. Maia wasn’t going to stop until she was destroyed.

  Maia flashed a grin so sinister, it far surpassed the definition of her own title. Dreaded fear clutched at my throat as another one of her lightning bolts lashed out, heading straight for me.

  “No!” The cry of defiance was loud, but I hardly heard it as my breath was once more knocked out of me.

  ☼

  11 ☼

  Pain and Pleasure

  I fully expected pain. Unlike last time, my expectations were fulfilled.

  But not in the way I’d thought.

  I tumbled onto the warm sand of the small beach by the lake, pushed away from the line of power. Starry Knight was trapped by Maia’s power, protecting me by taking it on herself.

  The onslaught of bodily pain, coupled with the coinciding arrival of terror and resentment, broke my heart. Inside of me, the shattering noise of everything I was or could ever be dying at the thought of Starry Knight dying, washed over me like silence after a symphony.

  She’s really got to stop saving me. The ironic, humorless attempt at humor was juxtaposed by the irritating thought that I needed her to save me at all.

  I thought about yelling at her as I pushed myself up.

  And then I saw her. The lightning sizzled around her, scorching her wings, and snagging the dark blue of her tunic-skirt. Her palms were blackened by blood and dirt.

  Maia unleashed her lightning again, causing Starry Knight to cry out. Maia cackled cruelly, while watching her scream in pain and wriggle in torment.

  My eyes never left Starry Knight as something began to happen inside of me. Something terrifying. What I felt was beyond words, and beyond pain and suffering. My head crackled open as memories started leeching into my consciousness.

  Her eyes caught mine.

  “Kid,” Elysian muttered weakly.

  I turned my attention from the horrific scene before me to face Elysian with rage and confusion stalemated on my face. Why was he interrupting me now? Now, when I had to do something!?

  “Here.” Elysian pushed my sword into my hands.

  I grabbed the hilt and hurried forward with no second thoughts. I launched myself off my knees and ran toward Maia, desperate to save Starry Knight.

  Maia saw me coming and laughed. “Foolish boy,” she cursed. Using her power, she hurled Starry Knight away from us. I watched, shocked with horror, as she landed far off into the deep waters of the bay area. “You have your own fate to worry about now.”

  Despair momentarily made me falter. Maia’s power came up quickly, taking deadly aim.

  But her power was not fast enough to stop mine.

  “No!” I slashed through Maia with the Sealing Sword, thrusting with my full weight behind the blade. She tried to back away, but it was too late. She'd underestimated me and the power given to me.

  I kept my gaze on her eyes as I watched her end come crashing in and all around her. There was no remorse and no sadness in her gaze as her body disappeared by her own power, buckling under my own. A flash of swirling emptiness and whirlwinding blue light flickered and then died.

  Maia was captured in her own black hole of a heart.

  I blinked a few times as the bright array of lights slowly subsided. When my eyes stopped flashing color dots all over my field of vision, I saw the Sinister was gone. All I saw that remained was a small, black chunk of rock, brightened only by the merest blue shadow.

  I might have stopped to examine it, pick it up, or tuck it away somewhere safe, but I knew my job was not over.

  “Aleia,” I called. “Take care of this.” I pointed down to the crystal rock that sealed away Maia’s power.

  “Are you okay?” she called back.


  I didn’t answer her. I raced to the water's edge and fleetingly hoped I was doing the right thing. I had to rescue Starry Knight.

  Please, help me find her. I have to do this.

  My feet landed hard on the water's surface, but I didn't stop to think about it.

  Aleia gasped behind me, and from Elysian’s silence, I knew I’d managed to stun him.

  Glancing around, trying to see if I could spot her, I felt my heart, along with my feet, start to sink and turn cold. Tossing the sword to the shore, I tried to recall in which direction Maia had cast Starry Knight.

  As I ran, I felt my feet disappear deeper and deeper into the water. I grimaced as the cold water bit at my skin and stuck to me relentlessly, but I didn't stop.

  I have to protect Starry Knight.

  Regret spurred me forward, even as the water finally glommed onto me.

  “No,” I sniveled. “This can’t be happening.”

  I need to find her. I can’t lose her. I just can’t lose her.

  All of the moments of my life between rejecting her last spring and that moment—the one where I was racing on the water, desperate to find her, aching to hold her and see to her needs—simultaneously pressed into me, reminding me I wanted her gone, I wanted her to go away.

  I was wrong. I was so wrong. I need her.

  I wanted her to go away, thinking it would make the pain go away. I should have realized only the pain would only go away when she returned.

  My wings stretched out at last, growing twice their size and lighting up with a blood-colored flame as power pulled out from the core of my heart.

  I felt a special awe and wonder as my feet left the last of the waters and my wings started to fly. Pure adrenaline and excitement raced through me, steadying me from my previous fear. A few awkward flaps happened, and I briefly felt a sense of unbelief hit me as I flew for the first time on my own.

  But I got the hang of it. Like surfing on the nebula with St. Brendan, a natural instinct took over, and I resumed my quest to find my missing counterpart. “Starry Knight!” I called. “Where are you?”

  From above the waters, I could see a small glow rippled out not far from where I was flying. Behind my heart’s distraught question, I felt an answering pulse.

  Without a second thought, I used what power I had to propel myself through the frigid winter water to find Starry Knight.

  My wings went dark and the water folded over me. Within seconds, I could see her. Starry Knight was writhing against the bonds of the water and its pressure. She struggled as I hurried over and reached out for her.

  A strong power took hold of me. I positioned myself as though I was in a dive—all those years on the Apollo City swim team had paid off—as light cut into the water’s surface.

  The water shifted around me, welcoming me in like an embrace. But I never lost sight of Starry Knight.

  A lively, ethereal spirit encased my hand as it reached out for hers. Her eyes opened as the light opened up to the sky, casting a halo of light all around us, and penetrating the dark depths of the water, where there was either only death or deliverance.

  I couldn’t speak or move much as the light transfixed her gaze and held me firmly. There was something strangely familiar about it. And then I knew. It was not the dying sun or the waning moon shining their light on her, as I might have thought.

  The Prince had come.

  Starry Knight gasped, a small stream of bubbles escaping her as the warmth of a subtle heat, the smallest remnant of the purest light, reached out between us.

  The darkness around her body trembled and she turned away from me.

  But my hand remained stretched out to her. I couldn’t move or exam it too closely.

  “I am waiting for you.” A voice, neither from the bowels of the earth or raining down from the heavens, gently thundered between us. I swore the waters receded from it, even as all life around us stirred, purring from such a tender caress.

  And then the light was fading, leaving . . .

  Starry Knight reached up with her own hand and clasped onto mine. “Wait!” she cried out, choking under the water at the release of her words.

  For the moment, I focused on only pulling her up as the light disappeared, the Prince along with it, as his hand was replaced by my own.

  Once we broke through the surface of the lake, I wondered at it and all that had happened. I grasped onto her, desperately relieved and terrified and hopelessly joyous, as she’d allowed herself to be saved.

  Gasping for breath, Starry Knight wiped the hair out of her eyes and looked on the one who had saved her. Me.

  “You!” By the look of it, Starry Knight could hardly say anything else.

  “I've got you,” I said to her, my voice strained and hard. “Can you swim?”

  She looked all around, as though she was trying to figure out what had happened. Finally, she looked at me and said, “My wings are heavy.”

  “The upside to not having any that consistently work, I suppose,” I muttered back, referring to my once-more small, dark, seemingly useless wings. I carefully put my arm around her waist. “Ready?”

  “Yes.”

  Slowly, the two of us made our way back to the shore.

  I lingered as much as I could, hoping no one would notice. I could see Aleia and Elysian back at the shore, shocked by the turn of events.

  “Thank you for saving me,” Starry Knight said, her voice croaking just a bit. “I am in your debt.”

  I shook my head. “You saved me first,” I told her. “If it hadn't been for you pushing me away, Maia would have gotten me instead, and . . . well, I'm a better swimmer.”

  For a moment there was silence, and then Starry Knight—amazingly—laughed. “I suppose that’s true,” she admitted dryly.

  We reached the shore too soon.

  Aleia came forward and helped pull us out of the water. “We managed to seal away Maia,” she told Starry Knight.

  “Good,” Starry Knight grumbled. “That’ll save me from having to cast her into the void myself.”

  “That only leaves us with three.”

  “Pride, Rage, and Greed. Perfect.” Starry Knight smiled despite her tone. “The last three are the worst to deal with.”

  “But Orpheus is no longer able to help them,” I said. “That’s something. Maybe they’ll be easier to capture because of that.”

  “I doubt it.”

  Aleia smiled. “We must celebrate what we can,” she said. “Let’s hurry and get out of here for now, before the media comes looking for us.”

  “That’s true. They’ll set their hounds on us, especially if SWORD’s not around,” I said. “Elysian, take Aleia back to where she needs to be.”

  “What will you . . . ”

  I turned to Starry Knight. “I want to talk to you.”

  “No,” she replied. “I’ve thought about it, and I don’t want to talk to you. You’ve made your feelings very clear in recent months, several times, and I get the message.”

  “Elysian, go.”

  “Right away, boss,” he said, making me bubble with pride as he picked Aleia up and carried her away.

  I’d been upgraded from “kid” to “boss.” Not bad.

  “I can fly away too,” Starry Knight pointed out.

  But I grabbed her hand and held it tightly in mine. “I want to say I’m sorry.”

  I almost laughed at the stricken expression on her face. The moonlight was coming out more quickly, now that Daylight Savings time had arrived, and the shadows of her face vanished at her disbelief.

  I let go of her hand and walked forward. There wasn’t much of a beach at Lake Erie, but there were some nice spots along the marina. And I wanted to share them with her.

  The instant I let go of my anger, so much hope suddenly poured in.

  “What?” she finally spoke.

  “I’m not apologizing again,” I insisted. “So you can stop pretending you didn’t hear it.”

  “Why?”

&n
bsp; “Why what?”

  “Why are you sorry?”

  “You know why.”

  “No, I don’t. I want you to tell me. It doesn’t count if you don’t tell me.”

  “What you mean,” I grumbled, “is that it doesn’t count if I don’t suffer.”

  She arched her eyebrows at me, and I relented. “Fine. I’ve suffered enough, I suppose, so it will be my pleasure to repeat it.” I reached out and took her hand again. “I’m sorry for hurting you. Back in the spring.”

  She shook her head. “I hurt you first.”

  “Then you should apologize.”

  Starry Knight stood her ground. “You know I won’t. I was trying to protect you.”

  “Because you love me.”

  “Wh—well, yes.” She blushed and looked away.

  “You’re in love with me.”

  “I already said I—hmph.”

  My lips pressed against hers the moment she turned back to challenge me. Her hair, still wet, was lined with the same slivers of moonlight radiating all along the small beach. Her eyes shut along with mine as we finally allowed ourselves a moment of truth between us.

  The taste of her, even under a layer of lake water, was so sinfully condemning, willing me to give up everything in my power in order to have her heart bound to mine. I could see why Orpheus had been devastated that the Prince told him she was meant for someone else on the other side of Time.

  I couldn’t say if it was the chilly air or our kiss that caused her to shiver. I reached up and cradled her face, drawing her in closer to me.

  How had I survived these last months? I wondered. How had I survived all these years without her? How did I go without this taste, the texture of her lips on mine?

  “It’s so strange,” I muttered against her mouth. “I don’t remember you more.”

  She pulled back. “You don’t remember me?” she asked.

  “Not your name,” I admitted, somewhat sheepishly. “But I saw you, before you fell, in Alora’s Time pool. I knew after one look, I’d been in love with you back then.”

  Starry Knight took another step back. “I think I should go.”

  “What?” I was confused. “What are you worried about?”