“Well, I’m sure your family aren’t going to hold you accountable for your uncle’s actions. He’s the one who’s doing the bad things, not you. It’s not your fault.”
“I feel pretty responsible,” I muttered. “I just wish I knew how to fix what’s happened.”
Sam nodded with understanding in his eyes. “I’m sure you’ll figure out what to do. Sometimes, there’s no magical solution to our problems—no matter how much we wish there was. You’ve just got to dig deep and assess your options. The solution to your problems isn’t always easy. But if your world is ending, you might have to take the hard road to fix it.”
I stilled as I looked at Sam, my beer halfway to my mouth, as I considered what he’d said. My father had faced the same dilemma when Belsnickel had first attempted to enslave the world. Creating the stars had been one solution, but there had been another one—a choice he couldn’t face. He’d needed to kill his mother by taking wood from the heart of her tree.
I placed my beer back down on the bar and jumped to my feet. I wiped the last remaining tears that streaked my face and I smiled up at Sam. “You’re right, Sam. You’re a genius,” I said.
Sam gave me a blank stare in response, as though he couldn’t believe he’d managed to fix my problems with a few vague sentiments. He’d said just what I needed to hear though.
“You’re welcome?” he said, but it sounded more like a question than a statement.
I gave him another smile before I started for the front door of the bar, leaving my half-empty beer on the counter.
“You know you’re fired, right?” he called after me. The words were said in a rush, like he’d only just remembered and wanted to make sure I heard him.
“We’ll talk about that later,” I shot back at him over my shoulder.
He threw his hands up in the air. “I’m serious, Clio!”
“Me too. See you soon, Sam.”
I pushed through the front door before he could try to respond. Hope was swirling in my belly once more. There was a way we could stop Belsnickel. It wasn’t going to be easy, but it was possible.
I came to a stop as I exited onto the street. I had no idea where to find Bethalial’s mother or her tree. I couldn’t even ask the others for help, because if I told anyone, then I’d fail before I even got a chance to try. Right now, I had the element of surprise, but I wasn’t sure if I could do this all alone.
“You’re not alone,” someone said from behind me. I turned and found Tomi standing on the doorstep of the pub. He was staring up at me with genuine concern in his eyes. Normally, all I got were grunts and scowls, but right now he was looking at me calmly.
“What are you doing here, Tomi?” I asked, glancing around the darkened street to see if anyone else was about. The town was empty and silent though.
“I’m here to help you,” he said.
I frowned in response. “How did you even know I needed help?”
“Because we’re connected,” he replied. “And I’ve been waiting a long time for you to accept your destiny,” he added with a grunt. “It’s about time you figured it out.”
My forehead creased further. “What are you talking about?”
He let out a sigh and walked out into the street to join me. “Tomten have a far more important purpose than just protecting their claus,” he said. “We bond with those clauses who are fated for great things. We help them stay on the right track and guide them when necessary.”
“Well, you haven’t done much of either of those things for me,” I replied.
“I’ve been guiding you more than you think.” Tomi shrugged. “You have an important task ahead of you, and you’ll need my help if you hope to succeed.”
I shook my head at him, still confused by how he was acting. “And what exactly do you think I’m supposed to do?”
“Kill Belsnickel,” he replied.
I stared down at my tomten in horror. I’d just been considering doing exactly that, but it was very different to hear the words spoken aloud. “Even if I’m supposed to do that, I can’t exactly talk to you about it. He might see it with his prophetic powers.”
Tomi shook his head though. “We’re connected to each other. He cannot see me either.”
I huffed out a breath and folded my arms across my body. “I’ve been trying to stop Belsnickel for weeks. Why didn’t you help me before now if that’s your life’s purpose?”
“Because your destiny was always your own to choose, and I couldn’t help you until you realized what you must do.”
I swallowed as the thought of what I had to do returned to my mind. “You really think it’s my destiny to kill Belsnickel?” I whispered.
Tomi nodded his small head at me, his eyes deadly serious for once. I’d never seen him so focused and composed, and I kept wondering what had happened to the brat I’d been living with all these years.
“And what happens if I don’t?” I asked.
“I think you know the answer to that,” he replied. “But it’s safe to say that you are the only one who can do it. You are one of very few beings who are beyond his prophet powers, and if you don’t make your move soon, he will be too strong to defeat. He will achieve that which he wishes, and we will all be doomed.”
“Well, that makes me feel much better. Thanks, Tomi.” I scowled at him, but he didn’t seem to notice. I let out a sigh and rubbed the side of my face. I’d felt a glimmer of hope when I’d walked out of the pub, but now, reality was crashing down all around me. I was somehow expected to kill a god.
“What do I need to do?” I asked him.
“You already know.” Apparently he was enjoying being cryptic.
“My father said the only way to kill a god was with wood from the heart of their mother’s tree,” I said. “But I don’t know where that tree is.”
“Yes, you do,” Tomi replied.
I frowned and turned away from him as I started pacing up and down the footpath. I wasn’t sure what Tomi was getting at, but there was no way I knew where to find an ancient tree that created gods. There was only one tree I could think of that might be old enough, but could the mother of gods really be somewhere so out in the open? A battle was raging around her; surely that couldn’t be right.
“Are you talking about Sage’s tree? The one in the center of the North Pole?”
Tomi smiled at me and nodded. “I guess you’re not quite as stupid as you look, after all.”
“Thanks for the vote of confidence.” I looked away from him as a car drove past us, but I kept staring into the darkness of the street beyond as I considered what I needed to do.
I somehow had to get to the ancient tree in the center of the North Pole without being killed in the battle going on around it. I then had to take wood from the heart of the tree, which would kill Sage, the mother of gods. Even if I managed to accomplish that, I then had to find Belsnickel and kill him. It was enough to make me want to run back to my apartment and hide.
A mixture of fear and confusion pulsed through my veins. I didn’t feel brave enough or strong enough to take on what lay ahead of me. But I knew I was the only one who had a chance.
I turned to look back at Tomi, who was still standing in the street with me, waiting patiently for me to get a grip on the situation.
“I guess we’d better get back to the North Pole then,” I said, but I felt completely unprepared for what came next.
Chapter Eighteen
The peppermint-scented magic of the sleigh line wafted around me as I arrived in the center square of the North Pole. I’d been prepared to open my eyes and find myself in the middle of battle, but instead, I was greeted by silence and a scene of total devastation.
Blackened earth covered the entire square, and the majestic homes that had once surrounded it were now just burnt shells. There was no fighting anymore, but the ground was covered in motionless bodies, both light beings and dark beings. Smoke rose from smoldering pits in the ground and ash floated through the air.
My body went cold as I set eyes on what remained of the ancient tree. The branches were bare of needles, and the tree was entirely black. Its limbs were broken in many places and there was no sign of life in the once majestic pine.
I ran toward it, my heart breaking with every step. So much death and pain surrounded the tree, and I feared that I was too late. I touched my hand to the tree trunk and prayed that Sage wasn’t gone.
“Sage?” I called out softly. “Please be there. I need your help.”
I waited for her to appear, but a feeling in the pit of my stomach told me she wouldn’t. The tree looked like it was already dead, and since the dark beings were now gone, I felt sure this was why they had focused their attack on the central square. Belsnickel had outsmarted me once again. He’d been one step ahead of me since the beginning; why would it be any different now?
I sunk to my knees as a wave of disappointment rushed over me. Tomi had told me this was my destiny, but I’d even managed to screw that up somehow. I glared into the ashy earth that surrounded the tree, a fresh wave of hatred toward Belsnickel swelling within me.
But then I noticed a soft whisper floating past my ear. A voice had said something so quietly that I could barely distinguish it from light breeze that brushed my skin. It sounded like it had come from close by though. I glanced up as the whisper came again.
“Clio.”
I jumped to my feet and rushed around the tree toward the noise. My heart was racing as I saw a woman lying on the ground. She was covered in ash and was only just visible against the charred earth. I fell to my knees at her side and brushed the ash away from the being’s face.
My stomach dropped as I realized it was Sage. Her dark skin was completely washed of color, and her green hair had become a dry yellow color. Her expression was fraught with pain, and I could see that she was dying. Her wise eyes were filled with sadness, and my heart broke to see her sorrow.
“Clio.” Her voice was still barely loud enough to hear.
“I’m here,” I said, grasping onto her hand. Her fingers were so cold, and the skin on her arms was flaking into ash, just like her tree. Her eyes fluttered shut for a brief moment before she grimaced and slowly opened them once more.
“We haven’t much time,” she said. “I must give you my heart.”
My eyes welled with tears and I started shaking my head. I knew I needed to take it to stop Belsnickel, but now that the time had come, I couldn’t do it. I refused to let Sage die for him.
“I can’t,” I said, my voice breaking as I said the words.
“You must,” she said. “You are our only hope.”
“But I don’t want you to die,” I replied.
She gave the smallest shake of her head. “I will not die,” she said. “I am the mother of gods, and a piece of me will always live on in my children and their own creations. But I cannot do that if they are not free to live. You need to stop my son.” A single tear dropped down her cheek, and I could see the pain it brought her to say the words.
“Please,” she added.
I started to nod, but it felt like my heart might break from the action. Sage gave me one weak smile before she reached out and touched the trunk of her tree. Magic swirled around her hand. It smelled nothing like her tree or any other magic I’d encountered before. It was like a million different scents were hitting me at once, and my body felt immersed in an all-encompassing power that rocked around me. It made the Christmas stars feel pathetically weak, and if I weren’t already on my knees, I felt like the power would have dropped me to the ground.
Sage’s magic sparkled brightly with every color I could have imagined. There were both bright shining colors and deep dark hues, as though her powers were a combination of both light and dark magic from all kinds of beings. As she pulled her hand away from her trunk, I saw a smooth piece of wood in her hands. As she cradled it, her magic began to swirl around the wood, and it transformed into a sharp weapon before my very eyes. As her magic began to disperse, she held the wooden stake out toward me. As soon as I took it in my hands, Sage’s body lit up in a blinding white light.
I shielded my eyes with my arms as pure whiteness surrounded me, only lowering them once the intense rays dispersed. Sage’s body was nowhere to be seen, and her tree had completely disappeared. The square was dark and silent once again, and it was like the ancient tree nymph hadn’t existed at all. I knew she had though, because I could feel her power throbbing in the wooden weapon I held in my hand.
The wood prickled against my skin, irritating it enough that I knew the wood was pine. It dawned on me that my allergy wasn’t all that unusual. Gods could only be killed by wood from a pine tree. Maybe that was where my sensitivity to it came from.
I summoned myself a backpack and placed the stake inside it before I slung it over my back and stood up. I felt numb as I looked over the ruined square once more. I knew Belsnickel had caused all of the destruction before me, and it was the one thing that kept me going.
Tomi was waiting for me by the sleigh point. “Now for the hard part,” he said.
I shook my head, struggling to believe anything could be harder than what I’d just endured. Sage had been so pure, and taking her heart had felt like an impossible task. But Tomi was right: what lay before me would be just as difficult.
“Where’s Belsnickel?” I asked.
“Returned to his place of power,” Tomi replied.
“And where exactly is that?”
He shrugged. “Where do you think?”
I huffed out a breath, growing frustrated by my tomten’s cryptic attempts to guide me. Belsnickel would base himself in a place where he could surround himself with dark beings, using his persuasion over them to create and control an army. He would return to the Southern Realm.
The bleak and barren swamp in the Dead Lands rose up in my mind. Roan had told me that the area was once the heart of the Southern Realm. The swamp had been a buzzing city and a god had lived in the palace in the center of it. All that remained now were ruins, but those ruins had been caused by a war between the gods a millennium ago.
“He’s in the Dead Lands, isn’t he?” I said.
Tomi shrugged again, but I could tell from the smug pull at the corner of his lips that I was onto something.
“He’ll have an army protecting him though. I can’t face an army alone with just a wooden stake.” I was speaking more to myself than to Tomi. I wasn’t even certain the stake would be enough to take on the god.
“No,” Tomi agreed. “But, then again, no one said you had to battle an army alone.”
I stared at him for several moments before glancing up at the castle that overlooked the North Pole. I couldn’t tell anyone that I had the stake or what I planned to do with it. But Tomi was right; that didn’t mean I had to enter the Dead Lands alone. What I needed was a distraction so I could get close to Belsnickel without him knowing I was coming.
I smiled down at Tomi. “Maybe you’re not such a bad guide, after all,” I said.
He grunted in response. “It’s like spoon-feeding a baby,” he grumbled. Though from the way his eyes lit up at my compliment, I knew he’d liked it.
“We better get to the castle,” I said before he could start moaning some more.
I didn’t wait for him to reply as I stepped into the sleigh point and transported myself up to the castle. I had to admit, the new sleigh point I’d created up there certainly was handy.
I wasn’t so pleased with myself when I arrived at the castle though. Dash was sitting on the side of the fountain, waiting. As soon as he set his eyes on me, I could see they were filled with disappointment.
“Where have you been?” he asked as he stood up and marched toward me.
I bit down on my lower lip as I considered how to answ
er. I wanted to tell him the truth, but I had to be cautious of what I said to him in case Belsnickel looked into his future.
“I went to Bramblewood,” I said. “I needed some time to myself after everything that happened.”
“Why didn’t you tell me what you were doing?” he asked. “I went back to Lapland, and you were gone. I’ve been worried sick.”
“Sorry, I wasn’t thinking clearly,” I said, wishing I didn’t have to lie. I wanted to tell him what I’d realized about Belsnickel’s prophetic powers and how we might have a chance at defeating him, but I already knew I couldn’t.
“That’s not a good enough excuse,” he said. “I thought something had happened to you.”
“Well, I’m fine,” I said with a shrug. I wished I could say more to calm his concerns. Lines of worry were still etched into his forehead, and he looked like he didn’t know whether to hug me or strangle me.
He seemed to really care about me, which I was surprised to find no longer shocked me. We’d grown close over the last few weeks, and I knew I’d feel exactly the same if he took off on me without warning.
“Just don’t disappear on me again,” he said, letting out a defeated sigh.
I nodded but remained silent. I couldn’t make him any promises, especially because of what I had planned.
“I’ve been thinking about our options, and I believe I know where Belsnickel is,” I said, trying to quickly change the subject.
The anger and worry faded from Dash’s eyes. “Where?”
“I think he’s gone to the Dead Lands. Belsnickel created the dark beings, and I’m convinced that the palace in the center of the ruins was once his. He’ll be stronger surrounded by his creations as he holds persuasion powers over them.”
“That doesn’t exactly help us,” Dash said.
“Actually, I think it’s time we went on the offensive, and now might be our only time to strike.”
Dash paused and narrowed his eyes as though he thought he’d misheard me. He took hold of my elbow and led me around the fountain so that we stood in its shadow, no longer in view of the castle.
Christmas Curse (Christmas Magic Book 3) Page 18