by Everly Frost
Beside me, Ember screamed. “No! Rift! It’s choking him. They’re trying to kill him.”
She dug her heels into her lion, wrenching on the straps, turning it back.
“Ember! You can’t—” Helen’s shout was lost in the beetle’s buzzing but the indecision was clear on her face. She lifted her fingers to her lips to whistle, but dropped them.
Ember rose on the lion’s back, balancing there as it ran.
Metal glinted in her hand, sparkling for a moment before her dagger flew through the dark.
It thudded into the drone that held Rift’s neck. In response, the drone released him, spinning backward. Rift rocked forward, coughing into the sand, but the drone that had caught his legs whisked him into the air upside down.
Ember raced forward, reaching for him, stretching out her hand for his.
My heart plummeted. A last drone sped out of the darkness, wrapped its tethers around her arm and torso, and snatched Ember off the lion’s back. It wrenched her skyward.
Ember screamed. Rift shouted, trying to reach for her.
Beneath them, the remains of the other drones sparked and wobbled as the lions batted them across the sand. There were no more drones, but my friends were captured.
My lion crested the dune and sand blocked everything from view.
Regret burned behind Helen’s eyes.
Angry tears burned behind my own.
Helen whistled and our two lions drove onward through the desert, further and further away from my friends.
Chapter Twenty
I TWISTED IN MY SEAT as the lions raced through the desert. “I have to go back!”
“You can’t, Ava. Those drones were just the first. The warriors won’t be far behind. You have to reach Mother.”
That’s what she kept telling me—that her mother had some knowledge about Alexander, something that would defeat him—but I was beginning to doubt it. What could anyone know that would help me stop someone who was an immortal? And now, Michael was gone. So were Rift and Ember. And Quake and Blaze. Only Snowboy was safe—or so I hoped.
“Why would President Vale let Olander deploy drones in Seversand?”
“If she gave him permission, then it means she’s backed into a corner. If she didn’t, it means she doesn’t control this situation anymore. Neither scenario is good.”
I screamed my frustration into the sky. “I should be turning around. I should be going back.”
“Ava, you can’t.”
“Your son is back there! The President’s son is back there! Ember is too and I’m the only one who’s still free. What if they kill her? What if they kill my brothers? If President Vale doesn’t control this situation anymore, then what’s keeping them safe?”
“Ava, I know you want to help them. I know you love my son. But if you don’t stop Alexander then this whole cycle will repeat itself over and over. He’ll keep hurting people.”
“But why am I the only one who can stop him?”
“Because you hold everything in balance. Because it’s your body that tips the scales.”
My body. But not me.
I rested my head over the lion’s powerful neck, sensing the pull of its muscles, trying to bury my fears. I didn’t know what was happening to the people I loved. They could be dying and I didn’t know.
The lions ran for the next hour and by then the sun’s first rays crept above the horizon. The landscape had begun to change. Endless sand had given way to rocky outcrops that were mottled and grey on the surface, but bright with quartz beneath. It made me think of molten lava that had cooled and hardened.
Helen pulled out a compass and checked it. “We’re almost there.”
She stopped us before the next ridge, alighting from her lion and brushing its mane. Then she surprised me by removing the straps on both lions and throwing them over her shoulder.
“The lions are hungry and thirsty. It’s best to let them go. There’s a waterhole nearby where they can rest.”
I stared at her dubiously. There was nothing but sand and rock nearby as far as I could see.
She smiled. “This way.”
I followed her up the rocky sand dune and stopped at the top, my mouth dropping open.
We stood at the top of a circular cliff. About fifty feet below us, a vast cavern resembled a lake, except that it was filled with sand, not water. Another cliff face rose sharply on the other side. The whole thing looked like a giant volcano filled with sand. “What is this?”
“The only way to Mother.”
I eyed her. “You mean we have to climb to the bottom.”
“No, I mean you have to dive into it.”
I peered at the sand. “Something’s moving down there…”
I backed away from the edge as I recognized the golden fins swimming in the sand below. “Those are sand sharks.”
“The only way in is through the sharks.”
“Are you serious?”
“I’m sorry, yes.”
She did look sorry. “Mother makes it very hard to get to her. You’ll have to leave all your weapons here or the sharks will rip you apart.”
“I don’t have any weapons.”
“Don’t you?”
I frowned at her, patting myself. Was there something I didn’t know about? Did I have a weapon after all?
“Your anger, Ava. You have to leave it behind.”
“I—” I frowned again, and for some reason, I thought of my brother, Josh. Mr. Bradley had said Josh’s reaction to nectar was emotional. That he’d felt rage. Could rage be a weapon?
It had only been through rage that I’d killed a hundred Evereachers on the mountains of Starsgard.
“I’m not sure that I know how to do that.”
“Well, you’ll need to find a way quickly, because we’re out of time and there are no lions here to help us.”
“What do you—?” But all it took was a glance across the distance to tell me that the Seversandian army was closing in. They jogged across the distant sand dunes down onto the flat ground. They were half a minute away.
My fists clenched. “How can I leave my anger behind? I’m so angry right now. I’m angry with you for stopping me from helping Michael. I’m angry that I couldn’t protect Rift and Ember. I’m angry that Rift thought his mother abandoned him. I’m angry that you left Michael in Evereach.”
My voice rose. “I’m angry that my stupid DNA can kill people. I’m angry that my parents are asleep. I’m angry that people think killing me and Ember is the right thing to do. I’m angry that there were children living in cells. Children!” I drew a final breath, exhaling all my rage with my words. I threw my head back and shouted into the hot sun. “I’m angry that my brother died!”
I screamed out all my anger until my lungs were empty, my cry echoing across the distance so far that the army faltered.
Then I took a step to the side, teetering on the edge of the cliff. “But I love your son. I loved my brother, Josh. And I love my mortal brothers. I will do anything to save them. Even let go of all that anger. Totally and completely.”
I plummeted into the cavern.
The wind rushed against my body. I hit the sand as the army reached the edge of the cliff above, swarming Helen. The last I saw of her before the sand sucked me down, she held up her hands in surrender.
I closed my mouth, but hot sand hit my tongue. My vision of a vengeful lion and the taste of sand in my mouth filled my mind and it was difficult to block it out. I squeezed my eyes shut, knowing only that I was falling and falling, that the sand rasped my skin until I was raw and the sharks nipped at my legs and arms, racing backward and forward against me.
My feet hit something solid, the force of the impact pushing the surface down. I crashed onto another hard surface—a marbled floor, jarring every bone in my body. I was scared I’d broken my ankle as pain shot through my leg.
A growl beside me forced me to turn.
I had to scoot backward to see all of the lion’s fac
e. The beast crouched, its head on its front paws, lowered to my eye level. Its jaws opened and it growl-roared at me.
There was no doubt in my mind that this was a fully-grown lion. I pushed myself backward and bumped against something soft. Another lion?
As I jumped upward, I came face to face with a woman. Her hair pooled at her feet, trailing behind her. Her eyes were brown, her skin olive. A red rock, just like Helen’s, glinted at the side of her nose.
She smiled. “You made it.”
Chapter Twenty-One
“Are you hurt?”
I wobbled on my feet, testing my ankle, thankful to find it stable when I put my weight on it. I breathed a sigh of relief. “I’m fine.”
The floor I’d landed on was glossy marble, the ceiling made of dark stone. There were no visible signs of the trapdoor I’d fallen through. In contrast to the golden lion, the walls and floor were pristine white, mottled by fine threads of gold and silver. Golden jewels like the ones worn by the lions were positioned around the ceiling and lit up the space as brightly as an electrical light.
The woman was even more beautiful than her surroundings. Her hair was a lustrous brown, her skin fine and unblemished, and her body language warm and welcoming.
I blurted. “I don’t know what to call you. Helen just called you ‘Mother.’ I don’t even know your name.”
“I’m Esther. And you’re Ava. Helen came to me two days ago and told me everything. Worst of all, she told me that Alexander is even more cruel than he ever was.”
As if it understood her, the lion rose to its feet, towering over me, shaking its mane. Its snout wrinkled as it snarled.
“You tried to kill him and failed,” Esther said to me.
“Yes.” The admission seemed worse in this beautiful place, but not because I’d failed—because I’d even tried. There was a time when the thought of ending someone’s life had been completely abhorrent to me. At some point, I’d lost that horror. Had war and cruelty taken it away from me? Or had I given it away freely?
I remembered telling Michael right back in the beginning that people were right to be afraid of me—that I could hurt them. At some point, I’d become what I feared. I had become death itself. I shook my head, trying to shake away my thoughts.
She said, “You want me to tell you how to fight him.”
I chose my words carefully. “I need to know how to stop him, yes.”
She tilted her head, her hair a cascade by her side. “But not to kill him?”
“I’m beginning to think trying to kill him is the wrong way to go about things.”
She smiled again. “You would be thinking right. Walk with me, please. I want to show you something.”
Beyond the marble room was another room with paneled walls that looked like they were made of gold and silver. Beyond that was a room decorated with a mosaic of colorful jewels. The mosaic formed the shapes of lions resting beside a stream. The actual lion prowled behind us as we walked, its claws clicking on the lustrous floor.
Finally we reached a room—a hallway of sorts—that stretched far into the distance.
“We didn’t have technology to record things when I was a girl. So we captured our history in songs. The problem with songs is that the words can be changed over time. Drawings are much more accurate. Don’t you think?”
I stared at the image on my right. A woman knelt on the ground, hunched, the curtain of her hair falling over her face. A dark presence loomed over her like an oppressive force.
“Eve was tempted by evil. But she resisted. She did not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil like the serpent wanted her to. Sin didn’t enter the world through her.”
Esther walked on. “And so it continued.”
I frowned at the next picture. Another woman knelt beneath the tree, her hand flung across her face. This time the dark presence took the form of a black bird with a red beak.
Esther leaned into me. “Helen told you that each daughter was born with immortality. But she lied to protect the truth.”
In the next image, another girl stood, one hand pressed to her heart, her other formed into a fist clenching so hard her knuckles were white. The malevolent force in front of her was covered in spines, sharp tips mere inches from her face.
Esther said, “We were tempted, cajoled, threatened, promised glory, forced to suffer pain and terrible loss. We faced our greatest fears. Evil takes many shapes to test our hearts. But we resisted. Immortality is earned, not given by birthright.”
“But…”
“For generations, children made a pilgrimage to the tree but it bore fruit only four times. When it was Alexander’s turn, he thought that all his good deeds would surely earn him the right to eat from the tree.”
“But he got a flower instead.”
“Ah, yes, the flower he thought was worthless. It never occurred to him that a flower could be more priceless than the fruit.”
I remembered the flower that grew when Michael and I kissed under the tree. “What could be more priceless than immortality?”
“Ava, all I can tell you is that it was the first flower to ever bloom on the tree. I can only guess why the Creator saw fit to give it to Alexander. Maybe you’ll figure it out.”
Further along the hallway, the scene of the first brother’s death confronted me. He lay like my own brother with a knife in his chest, bleeding beneath the tree, while Alexander gleamed at the plum in his fingertips.
I looked for the flower in the image, but all I saw was a petal peeking from Alexander’s fist. He’d crushed it. The same way he’d stomped on the flower Michael and I had made.
“How do I stop him?”
She spread her arms wide. “I’ve already told you.”
“No … you really haven’t…”
But as she stepped aside, I found myself looking from image to image. Every one of those women had stood beneath the tree. Every one of them had faced something awful. They’d been tested—and prevailed.
“You must find the raging lion, Ava.”
The real lion growled beside me.
Esther rested her hand on its head, quietly looping a harness around its neck and holding it firm. “You need to go now, Ava.”
There was a warning in her voice.
I eyed the lion and the way it sniffed me. The sand had scratched my arms and some of the cuts were beginning to bleed. The lion growled, nuzzling closer, inhaling the scent of my wounds.
“There’s a reason lions don’t attack people,” Esther said. “They only kill for food and they’ve learned that people don’t die. Therefore, people aren’t food. However … that’s not the case with you.”
My eyes widened. I backed up. “How do I get out of here?”
“Down the corridor, first door on the right, there’s a single pod transporter that will take you most of the way back to the Coliseum. You’ll need to walk the rest.”
I raced away as the lion growled and snarled behind me, past the images lining the walls, past thousands of years of history, determined to return to the place where the first battle was fought.
I waited for night to fall before I emerged into the desert. Waiting for the sun to go down had given me time to think and plan.
It was only an hour later that I reached the circumference of Seversandian warriors guarding the Coliseum. I held my hands high as they called for me to halt.
I recognized the woman with the plait in her hair as I called, “I’m Ava Holland. Please take me to the President.”
She quickly restrained me, tying my hands behind my back. “Why did you come back?”
“I have my reasons.”
“Should I expect a fight from you?”
I shook my head. “No.”
She called for one of the other warriors to run ahead and alert the President. Then she and three others escorted me back to the Coliseum. It was slow going. Balancing in the sand was more difficult with my tied hands, but I focused on placing one foot in front of th
e other.
When we reached the colossus, the inscription above the entrance proclaimed: Only the worthy. I knew I wasn’t, but my purpose wasn’t for myself anymore.
I strode into the glow of the corridor to face the Seversandian President herself, only realizing when I entered just how many people had crowded into the passageway. The right-hand side was packed with Seversandian warriors. Each of them held bows with arrows aimed directly at me. On the left, Evereachers bristled with daggers and swords.
Both Olander and Alexander waited a step behind President Vale. Olander’s expression was blank, but Alexander’s arms were folded across his chest as if my surrender had unnerved him.
President Vale was wide-eyed. “Ava. They said you gave yourself up, but I didn’t believe them.”
I planted my feet, keeping my eyes on Alexander as I spoke. “I won’t fight you. You can have what you want, but you’ll do it my way.”
President Vale turned pale. “But … that means…”
“Will you agree to grant my terms?”
Olander was smooth as oil. “Well, of course, that depends on what they are.”
“You won’t kill me until all of the world’s leaders are here. Every one of them takes responsibility for this.”
“That’s not hard to arrange,” Olander said. “Since they’re already here.”
I continued without missing a beat. “Second, I’ll die by the hand of a Seversandian warrior.” I broke eye contact with Alexander only long enough to gesture to the woman with the plait, startling her. “By her hand.”
Olander’s eyes narrowed.
I returned my gaze to Alexander. He hadn’t moved.
“And, finally, you’ll kill me beneath that tree.”
I didn’t need to point. For the first time, Alexander dropped his arms. He stared at me and then at the mangled mass resting in the darkness beyond.
He darted across the distance, grabbed me by the back of my neck, and jerked my head back, glaring at me. “What are you playing at? What game is this?”