“What?” Sable asked, immediately on alert. She and Tauren stepped forward, hovering close to their son.
“Something’s not right.” Panic filled my stomach. “River!” I pulled him close, trying to warm him and coax him back. “River, come back to me.” I realized I could no longer feel our link. “I can’t…. I can’t feel him anymore.”
River’s body seized and he slumped to the ground. As I scrabbled to catch him, Sky and Lyric sprang into action, helping me ease him to the ground. “River!” I screamed frantically. “River, come back!”
Sable dropped to her knees and cried out to Fate, begging him not to take her son, begging him to bring River back to us. Tauren put an ear to his mouth. “I don’t feel his breath,” he shrilled.
I placed my palm over his heart, feeling it beat lazily once, twice. Then…I didn’t feel it again. “River, no. Please don’t leave me. Please come back to me. You promised.”
Suddenly, a bright, white light surrounded us. For a moment, I saw him. I saw his soul, escorted by a shimmering light, float toward his body. When his soul reunited with his body, his once-dead eyes focused on me and he smiled. “Sorry that took so long.”
I sobbed, gathering him in my arms and holding him tight. I clutched him so tightly I thought he might break, but I knew if I let him go, I would be the one who broke.
He shushed me and rubbed my back, telling me over and over again that he was fine and all was well. He came back to me. He promised never to leave for that long again. I never wanted him to leave me again, even for a moment.
Finally, I realized he was okay. He was here. His heart was beating. I felt it under my palm, steady and strong. His warmth returned, fed by mine, and his voice in my ears was as musical as Lyric’s voice. “That was really close, wasn’t it?” I rasped, finally pulling away. A movement caught my eye.
Brecan bowed low at the waist. Mira, Ivy, and Ethne did the same. “Priestess Ela,” they said in unison, addressing the light.
Sable stiffened beside me, tears still shimmering in her eyes. “Was it you who saved him?” she asked.
Ela manifested, the shimmering ball of light taking the shape of an elderly woman with eyes as sharp as Sable’s, but not nearly as kind. She spoke, but her words were distant. River listened and spoke on her behalf.
“She apologizes, Mom. For not being the guide you needed or deserved. For not understanding your power. She says she understands now that I explained Fate’s involvement. She says I have much to tell you, and that we should all prepare as quickly as possible. The Shadowed are coming.”
Tauren looked from Ela to River and grabbed his son’s hand. “You need time to recover. We’ll have time to discuss this after—”
“But there’s not, Dad,” he interrupted. “You have to get Knox. We need the Guard to mobilize. And we need every witch to gather with the Guard all along the Kingdom’s border.”
“Calm down,” the King reprimanded his son in a gentle tone.
Frustration sparked in River’s eyes. “You don’t understand.”
Ela’s light flared. Without hesitation, River offered her his arm and her voice echoed through the Center. “Listen to your son. There is no time to spare. They’re coming. They’re coming for River,” she added, “and for all of you.”
Ela looked up to the heavens and her light began to fade. “The Goddess is calling me back,” she said, still clasping River’s arm. “I’m afraid I must go. Remember the book, River. Guard it and remember what I told you about why Cyril wants you.”
“What book is she talking about?” Sable asked after Ela’s light winked out.
River sat up, wincing as he plucked a book from the back waistband of his pants.
“Where did you find that?” Sable whispered, studying the leather-bound cover.
He answered, “It belonged to Ela’s great-grandmother. She showed me where it was hidden. You should read the last page.” He handed the book to his mother and she gingerly opened it.
Her eyes danced over the words he’d asked her to read. “It’s written in her blood, sealed with her magic. It’s how Nonna wrote all her prophecies,” she breathed. “I only saw her book of shadows once, when I was a child, and only by accident. But even then, I felt the power contained within its pages.”
I felt it, too. Sky leaned in, waving Lyric forward to look at the book’s open page. What does it say?” Sky asked, plucking the words from my mouth.
Sable swallowed thickly. “It says we must all fight. Together.”
“Against what, exactly?” Lyric asked.
River explained how Ela helped us by traveling to the mountain, and how she showed him what lay on the shadowed side of the ridge. He spoke of the army of banished, and then of the army of Shadowed, revealing that both would attack simultaneously and soon.
“We’ll be fighting both of them at the same time, and we have to fight together or we lose, in this realm or the next. We have to protect Fate, as well as stop Cyril and the male Fate witch under her tutelage, a witch caster.”
Ethne sucked in a shocked breath, clasping her chest. “A witch caster? How will we fight one who can render us useless?”
Brecan stood up straighter. “By taking out the witch caster before he can use his magic against us.”
Mira moved closer to Arron’s side. “We will fight as one.”
“Will we win?” Sky asked, looking around at our unlikely band of witches, royals, and Fate-Kissed.
Everyone waited with bated breath for Mom to answer, but what she provided wasn’t the one any of us anticipated. She looked at the blood inked on the page. “It doesn’t predict the outcome, only the battle.” She read the words aloud slowly, carefully, pausing where indicated, bringing Nonna’s words to life again.
I stood, finally feeling my fingers and toes, thankful that Fate was with me. He filled me with his power and turned my resolve to steel. I motioned to the border of Thirteen where it met The Wilds. “The banished and Shadowed are coming. We must draw on every ounce of Fate’s magic to defend the Kingdom. We need every soldier, and we need every witch prepared to spirit them to positions all along the border.”
“Why are they targeting you?” Omen asked, her brows furrowed.
“Because Cyril thinks I can raise the dead.”
Sable’s lashes fluttered as her eyes shut. “That’s because you can.”
31
River
What do you mean?” I whirled around.
She exchanged a troubled glance with my father before she began. “River, you can cross the realms and touch spirits. You call on them and keep them with you, and when you tire of them, you can send them away. You speak with them and they show you what no one else can see. Your gift isn’t just to speak with the dead; I believe with all my heart that you could bring one back if they were newly dead. I believe you could take hold of the soul and put it back into its body, if you chose. Fate made you his ferryman for a reason, River. I think you’ve just brushed the surface of what you’re truly capable of.”
“And Cyril knows that,” Dad added. He pursed his lips, swallowing thickly and rocking back on his heels as he admitted, “I know you see my father and that you speak with him often.”
I nodded, a knot forming in my throat that made speaking difficult. “He doesn’t want to leave Grandmother.”
Great-Grandmother Ela called me spirit tongue and soul walker. My mother called me Fate’s ferryman. If it was possible that I could grant life after death, maybe I could also take it. Was that something for which Cyril considered and planned?
Brecan promised to return and spirited away, bringing a very surprised and sleepy Knox with him. His hair was mussed, his eyes glassy from sleep. “What in the world is happening?” he asked, looking at each of us gathered in the Center.
Dad filled him in while Brecan, Ethne, Ivy, and Mira re
adied the witches. They dressed for battle, wearing thick leather armor in the colors of their Houses, no doubt created and designed by Mira and the glass spiders she spelled to life to weave her creations.
The leather of their armored suits was layered heavily over the heart, the source of the soul and all magic. Those with long hair pulled it back out of their faces. Some carried spell books. Others practiced their affinities, conjuring flame, wind, water, or roots from the palms of their hands.
Mom shouted defensive spells to reflect a magical assault, but told the witches across each affinity to make the spells their own. She advised the Fire witches to infuse flame into their words, for the witches of Earth to make their shields grow, for the Air witches to blast it toward their enemies, and for the witches who wielded water to drown their enemies with their intent.
“This is no time to hold back. If you do, you will die. We are about to face the first witch caster in centuries, maybe millennia. He will try to rob you of your magic. You must fight to protect it, and you must fight to protect your way of life! Those you love…everything is at risk,” she shouted, a battle cry that elicited an answering roar from every witch in The Gallows. The sharp tang of magic filled the air, stinging the back of my throat.
Setting the battle plans in motion, witches disappeared in clusters, spiriting to the Palace where Knox would instruct them where to take the Guard to meet the foe at the borders. I wanted to help, but there was no time. The souls were so close, the air turned thick with the stale scent of death, like moth-eaten fabric and dust.
Tension filled the air like the crackling electricity born of a thunderstorm.
I could feel them.
Spirits. Souls. Thousands of them.
The Shadowed.
Omen stood steadfastly by my side, stroking the hag stone in her pocket, with Sky and Lyric to her right. “Omen, if she should happen to capture me, I want you to use the stones to end me.”
She gasped, shaking her head, anguish shining in her eyes. “I would never hurt you.”
“I would rather die than have her use me to hurt you,” I breathed. “If Cyril or the witch caster capture me, I’m as good as dead anyway. They plan to cast out my soul to take over my body and power. With me as their conduit they could end Fate himself, Omen. And if they did that, all would be lost. Lindey, Lyric, Sky…everything you love and everyone who loves you. I need you to give me your word.”
She shook her head, tears swimming in her eyes. “I love you, River. You can’t ask me to do this. I won’t. I don’t want to lie to you.”
“Then don’t.” I brushed a tear from her eye and kissed her cheek. “I love you, too. I want you to know that in case—”
“Shhh.” She pressed a finger to my lips. Suddenly she jumped away, looking at the ground to the rocks that lay beneath it. “Do you feel them?”
I nodded grimly. “Fate is sending a very loud warning.”
“I hear him in the wind,” Sky agreed.
“And I hear him in every sound,” Lyric said softly. “The three of us will shield, like the prophecy said. We’ll do our best to keep you and your mother safe, River.”
“I need you to do more than that. I need you to protect and shield the entire Kingdom.”
Sky snorted. “What an obnoxiously princely and enormous demand for you to make to those who don’t reside within your borders.”
“I do my best,” I teased. Omen clasped my hand, squeezing it tight. She glanced at me as Mom appeared to my left.
“It’s time to man the border. We can’t let them in.” I noticed Mom hadn’t bothered with armor. She didn’t need it. She was impenetrable.
“Is Fate with you?” I asked, just to make sure.
“He is, and he’s with all of you,” she said, looking at each of the Fate-Kissed.
Ready to do battle with spirit and bone, we formed a circle, joined hands, and together, spirited to the border. The magic of Thirteen’s border wall crackled in front of us as we saw members of the Guard and witches from every house spread out through the forest around us. A line of formally trained soldiers and magically trained elemental witches…and then there was us.
Fate surged into me, his power knocking me off balance. “They’re here,” I panted.
The roaring of a thousand charging voices came from the other side of a hillside as the first of the banished appeared, brandishing swords and axes, daggers strapped to their chests and hips.
“Shield the Kingdom!” I yelled to Omen, Lyric, and Sky.
Omen gasped as she took them in, and in the distance, the great mountain seemed to breathe. The side closest to us heaved and great boulders tumbled down its face, rolling through wide sections of the army of the banished. And Omen had only gotten started.
Lyric began to sing protection spells.
“If you see the witch caster, hit him with your magic and hit him hard!” I screamed to every witch in earshot. We’ll only get one chance.”
Sky raised her hands and a dense fog rose from the ground, swallowing up the banished soldiers and slowing them considerably. Slowed, but didn’t stop. They trudged forward single-mindedly, fighting their way through the mist. Our soldiers in the trees notched arrows on their bowstrings, ready to unleash them as soon as the invading army stepped out of the fog.
“They can’t breach the border wall unless the witch caster destroys the magic fueling it,” Mom warned.
We gritted our teeth and waited.
Sable
When Brecan spirited Tauren to me, I lost my composure. “What are you doing out of the palace? You can’t be here!” Then another Air witch appeared with a camera crew in tow. “Are you insane?” I snapped.
The camera’s eye focused on us, but my attention was on Tauren as he began to speak, pleading with me.
“The Kingdom needs to see this! The Purists have been relentless in stirring their emotions, but what the citizens don’t realize is what the Purists have been planning from outside and within our borders. Our guard is busy thwarting attacks in the Sectors as we speak, but the people don’t know the Purists banded together with the banished to form an army with a single goal: destroy the Kingdom and everyone in it.”
“They don’t need to see this. It’s dangerous,” I argued.
Tauren reeled me in. “Show them. Show them the heart of their Queen. I want them to see exactly how far you would go to protect them.”
I would die for Tauren. This kingdom was my home and I would die to protect it, as well. He knew that, and now, as the cameras zoomed in on the scene, the citizens would know, too.
“They stay, but you, my King, have to promise to go back with Brecan.” I looked at my best friend. “Keep him safe and make sure he stays put.”
“I’ll hand him over to the care of Knox and Leah,” Brecan saluted with a smirk.
Tauren’s shouts of protest vanished along with him and Brecan.
The axe of a banished man with shaved hair and wild eyes struck the border wall, the crackling magic barrier sending him sprawling on his back. He roared and jumped back up, slashing again and again, careful not to hit it too hard. Searching for weaknesses. An archer in the pine overhead pulled his bowstring taut.
“Do not fire unless commanded, soldier. Do you understand?”
He slackened the string and bowed his head. “Yes, my Queen.”
“I don’t want anyone to die, but if this wall comes down and they enter the border, you may fire at anyone breaching it. If the witch caster approaches, you hit him first and with all your might.”
A great shadow fell over the land even as the sun’s first rays lightened the sky, painting it gold and orange and pink. “The Shadowed,” River breathed. His eyes widened and I knew it must be far worse than I could imagine. “Fate be with us.”
The earth underfoot trembled as Omen raised stones, thousands of them,
into the air. They hovered at her command as she waited for the witch caster to show his face. Lyric sang sweetly, her tone fluctuating as the menacing shadow drew near. Sky called for a storm unlike any I’d seen before. In the blink of an eye, the golden aura of dawn was erased, replaced with a green-gray hue. Heavy thunderheads built high into the heavens and lightning danced across the sky in a frantic pattern. Sky smiled.
“Fate protect my son,” I whispered. “Be with us all. We fight for you.”
He filled my stomach with warmth, almost like he was still within, like he’d never left, but this warmth didn’t last. A dreadful feeling coiled in my stomach.
Just on the other side of the border, close to the wall, I saw a young man assisting a middle-aged woman as she limped toward us. The banished man wielding the axe slashed at them, attempting to take limb or head off, but somehow the boy managed to block his blow. He moved so fast, I couldn’t see what he’d done to deflect it.
“Lindey?” Omen shrieked, running to the wall. “It’s Sebastian and Lindey!” she cried to River.
I watched the boy’s features, watched him smirk at her reaction. A spider thrilled to see his prey approach.
“Omen, no!” I screamed, preparing to spirit to her, to stop her…She didn’t see the boy raise his hand, or the power flow out of it until it was too late. “He’s the witch caster!”
32
Omen
Time slowed as River raced with me toward Lindey. I thought the witches said they found her in the Kingdom! Had she been in East Village all along? We had to bring her across to safety while there was still time. Thankfully Sebastian was helping her run, and they narrowly avoided a crazed fellow with an axe. “Lindey!” I cried.
Dimly, I heard Sable scream behind me, “Omen, no!”
Sebastian raised his hand, I thought to avoid slamming into the invisible border wall, but Sable screamed four words that made my rib cage clench. “He’s the witch caster!”
The Omen of Stones Page 26