The Midnight Strider
THE CHRONOMANCER CHRONICLES
VOLUME II
Reilyn J. Hardy
Mellor Publishing House
HONOLULU, HAWAII
Copyright © 2016 by Reilyn J. Hardy.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.
Publisher’s Note: This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are a product of the author’s imagination. Locales and public names are sometimes used for atmospheric purposes. Any resemblance to actual people, living or dead, or to businesses, companies, events, institutions, or locales is completely coincidental.
Illustrations ©2016 R. Mellor
Edited by: Kaz Vasquez
Book Layout ©2016 BookDesignTemplates.com
The Midnight Strider / Reilyn J. Hardy. -- 1st ed. Paperback.
ISBN-13: 978-0-9971587-3-1 • ISBN-10: 0-997-1587
Chapter one
insight through time
Everything’s changed since I died. Though to my surprise, my father wasn’t especially angry over it. No where near as angry as I thought he’d be, anyway.
I sit in my room most days, with my back pressing up against the messy carvings of Apollo’s name in the wood. The blood’s dried and flaked off since I scratched it there in the first place.
My stare’s often fixed on Jace’s bed across the room, occasionally glancing over at the hole in the wall near the door. People knock, usually Amelia, but no one really bothers me. They’re all too preoccupied with Nova now, and I prefer it that way.
Nova’s a phoenix, a creature of Glasskeep. The old city of my people. These creatures live out an entire lifespan over the course of a year. They die when it ends, and are reborn in the ashes when the new year comes, gender varying with each reincarnation. Nova turned back into her bird form shortly before bursting into flames on the eve, and a male baby bird peeked through the ashes of the former’s remains when the new year arrived. Rhiannon and I missed it. We were still in Nevressea. Still waiting for Jace.
I haven’t seen Nova yet. A part of me doesn’t really want to. I’m not sure why. I’m sure there’s a reason, but my thoughts haven’t been clear in a while.
I sit here alone, mindlessly picking at the scabs around my wrists, day after day. Alekoth, Father Time, told me they hadn’t healed when I became a chronomancer because they were given to me outside of this realm. Same with the welts and lacerations on my back from being tortured in Mithlonde. I pick at the scab, and blood gushes out from beneath it once I manage to scrape it from my skin. I don’t want them to heal.
Everything’s different, but no one will say so. We don’t talk about what Amelia did, or the hag in Nevressea, my death, or Jace. We don’t talk about any of it at all. On the few chances that I see Rhiannon in the hall, she never mentions him. Her eyes look tired, but she always manages to give me a reassuring smile before disappearing behind her own door down the hall from mine.
The snow outside continues to glisten brightly beneath the sunlight, as though snow freshly fell overnight. I still don’t know where exactly my dad’s cabin is located, but I don’t really know how to bring that up in conversation. Amelia brought us back here when we wanted to leave Nevressea. Perhaps it was need to know. I guess I didn’t really need to know. Still, I wondered.
I sneak out at night when I can’t find anything desirable to eat in the kitchen. With Amelia doing most of the cooking, few things are desirable. But with the snow so prevalent, I’m not sure what I’m going to find out there.
Sometimes I sit on the front stairs, looking out at the trees that surround us. Sometimes I’ll take steps further out, but I never wander too far. There are times when I hear noises, turning around I expect to see Mother Nature standing there, but it’s never her. Just a deer passing who stops to look at me, or a bird ruffling its feathers up in the trees.
Sticking my hands into the pockets of my jacket, I walk further, and the snow crunches beneath my boots. It’s calming, out in the woods. No one around but the serenity of nature. It’s nice to not be cooped up in my room. To hear someone rapping my door with their knuckles. I know it’s because they care, but nothing’s wrong with being alone.
Crouching down, I dig something out of the snow. The remains of a rotten apple. I can hear Jace’s voice, asking me whether or not I noticed that Mr. Jameson’s tree somehow always had apples right after winter, as if the tree bloomed when the world was at its coldest. I feel like now I should have taken advantage of that while I had the chance. We never really know how blessed we are till those blessings are no longer.
My stomach growls. I drop the apple back onto the snow. Starting to stand, I realize it dropped harder than it should have. The apple ripened. Plump, the red apple sat there like it had just fallen from the tree. I look around, but I’m alone. I did that. I must have. I ripened an apple. I pick it up and toss it in the air, catching it with my other hand, wondering if I can do it again.
It’s not as easy the next time, but I manage. I keep practicing till it becomes second nature.
There are times when I can feel someone watching me, but I don’t pay attention to it. It’s likely Amelia, keeping an eye on me.
Like old times. I’m not the same person I was back then, but neither is she.
Most of my nights are spent outside now, while my days are spent cooped up in my room. Sometimes asleep, sometimes staring blankly at the other side.
There’s a leather bound book resting on the bed beside my leg. It’s the journal of my grandfather, the Time Keeper. It’s filled with memories of his life, but I’ve yet to fully read through it. It feels like an invasion of his privacy.
On the first page, it reads:
We never meant to do what we did, we never meant for any of it to happen.
After that, I closed the book, but I kept it close to me. I knew what they did. I knew that story well. The legend of the Time Keeper and his Enchantress, and the years it rained red.
Moving my fingers behind my neck, I feel for the triskelion that branded itself onto my body. I can feel the spirals, and where they interlock at the center.
I’m a chronomancer.
I frown slightly at the thought. Maybe I needed to stop wasting time and start getting answers from it. That’s what chronomancy was, after all. Gaining insight through time. The main ability of my people.
Grabbing my grandfather’s journal, I start flipping through the pages, only to be reminded that he began keeping this after they started their new life in Edgewick. It wasn’t going to give me any information about chronomancy or Glasskeep. I shove it off of my bed. It’s useless.
The Time Traveler will rise, but not without force.
What did that even mean?
I slide off of my mattress and move to my desk, flipping the dragon book open. The Time Keeper left me various tokens and time pieces, but I still don’t know what any of them mean or do, aside from the obvious. Assuming the time pieces did anything but tell time. An hourglass, a pocket watch, a prism, little sundials, water clocks, and a few other items I don’t recognize. The logical thing, I know, is to ask my dad, Father Time, what they’re for.
But I don’t
want to talk to him.
I pick up one of the little sundials. Flipping it over a few times, I twist the center dial. I’m not sure what I’m looking for. Instructions, perhaps? Who am I kidding, why would an ancient time piece come with instructions?
Carelessly, I throw it back onto my desk, and it doesn’t clatter. It makes no noise. The sundial lands against the earth. I’m no longer in my room; I’m not in the cabin at all. I scoop it up out of the dirt, and I look around. The creaky old trees. The whispers in the wind, between the branches. It registers.
I’m in the Whispering Woods again, at the base of the silver bark tree. Jace drops down onto the ground in front of me. I slip the sundial into my pocket and begin to crawl up the tree just as I remembered doing so, only he doesn’t see me. He’s not paying attention to me at all.
Rhiannon lands down in front of him, and when he tries to attack her, she kicks him in the face, right against the wound I had given him. He shakes it off, and tries again. It’s the same thing, over and over. She tries pleading with him, talking some sense into him, but it’s no use.
That goblin really twisted his mind.
I turn away. I start fumbling with the sundial again, trying to figure out how to get back to the cabin, except I have no idea what I did. It’s lit in my hands, shadowing the time, which is not moving very quickly. In fact, it’s hardly noticeable.
I look up again, and Rhiannon changes down from her massive winged, vampiric appearance back into her human form. She just stands there while the oversized wolf growls at her.
“I’m not going to fight you anymore,” she says. Her dress is torn, and she’s bleeding out through several wounds. Her leg is sliced open — I can still see him dragging his claw through it and piercing her foot. “So if you want to kill me, then go ahead and just do it, because I’m tired, Jace, and I won’t continue with this.”
I can’t believe what I’m seeing. What I’m hearing. Vihaan was right. I shake my head as I turn away. Jace won’t attack her while she looks like that, will he? I close my eyes. He must have thought about it when she was sitting in the cage behind me in Thealey. I don’t know how much control he has over it on a normal day. I doubt he has any control now.
I open my eyes.
“Stop!” I yell, just as he lunges. But they don’t hear me.
I expect her to move out of the way, hoping she’s trying to trick him. But she doesn’t. She doesn’t scream when he bites into her side, though there are tears sliding down her face. I can see it glistening beneath the moonlight. He claws into her, and she keeps her word.
She doesn’t fight back.
I don’t want to watch, but I can’t bring myself to look away.
“Jace, stop!”
He can’t hear me still.
I can’t tell if she’s moving anymore and my vision begins to blur. I look down at the sundial in my hands and try fumbling with the center piece. It turns.
The ground shakes as the cabin walls shoot up to the air, breaking through the surrounding trees. My father’s cabin forms around me like it’s growing out of the ground.
It’s quiet, and I’m standing at the foot of the stairs near the front door. When I walk up and peer into the upstairs hallway, Jace is at Rhiannon’s door. His arm in a sling. I keep my focus on him as I walk around him and into the room. The cut in his face still bleeds — the cut I gave him — and his skin is covered with purple and black splotches. His eyes are red, watery. Shining in the light. He blinks and tears fall; he looks away when they do. Rubbing his nose just before pressing his palm to his undamaged eye, he’s trying to act like he isn’t crying.
I drop the sundial into my pocket again and turn to look in the room. My dad is slowly running his hand over Rhiannon’s stomach, letting his palm hover above her, emitting a faint white glow.
The sheets are soaked in black blood.
“It’s a good thing you aren’t an alpha,” Father Time says. I look back at Jace, but he’s gone.
I find him in our room, pulling all of the rings off of his right hand. They drop onto the desk in a clatter while he effortlessly rips through the strings tied around his wrist. He paces between the beds, twisting the silver ring on his left pinky. I remain at the door and he walks toward me, but he doesn’t leave. Instead, he turns toward the wall and leans his forehead against it before wiping his face again.
He shoves his fist right through the wood. It cracks, startling me.
Jace presses his fingers to the damage in the wall as his knees give out. Collapsing, he manages to turn his body, and leans back against the wood as he reaches the floor. His face is damp.
“What have I done…”
He’s trembling.
I can’t see him like this.
I take a step back and turn away, nearly bumping into Amelia. Instead of colliding with her, she goes right through me.
I turn around again.
“She’s going to be okay,” she says to him and he scrambles to his feet. “You didn’t damage her heart and you didn’t tear off her head. Alekoth gave her some of his blood so she should be —”
Jace cuts her off when he wraps his arms around her, hugging her tightly.
“What about Mae?” he asks, his voice is shaky.
“I don’t know. We can’t track him — which means he made it. He’s a strong kid, he’s always been. I’m sure he’s fine,” she says, awkwardly patting his shoulder. “Don’t blame yourself for things you can’t control.” Jace pulls away from her and crosses his arms, averting his gaze. “Do you want to see her?” she asks, but he shakes his head.
“I tried to kill her.”
“You were manipulated. The Whispering Woods are a dangerous territory for people like me and beings like you. Go see her, Jace. She’s all cleaned up now.”
He wipes his face again and nods finally.
I follow him back into Rhiannon’s room. It’s cleaner. Her sheets are no longer drenched in blackish blood, but changed to clean linen. She’s dressed in a nightgown and tucked beneath the blankets, appearing to be asleep. Jace lingers at the door for a little while, before allowing himself to take a step in. He sits on the chair beside the bed, where my dad originally sat, and takes her hand. Rubbing the back of it with his thumb, he leans forward and kisses the back of her fingers.
The cut down his face stops bleeding. It’s starting to heal. She’s healing him.
I grab the sundial from my pocket and run downstairs, looking for my dad. He’s in the kitchen with Amelia, who tries to insist he needs sleep. There are two unusual hourglasses sitting on the table in front of him. One where the sand move slowly in a circular motion and the other, the sand has stopped entirely. Etched in the glass are two names, Apollo’s and mine, respectively.
I think I remember seeing them before when I was younger but I can’t be sure. Chronomancy, chronomagy, chrono — well, all of it, can be nasty business.
Alekoth shakes his head at her words. “Not until I find my son,” he says.
The sundial slips from my hand, and clatters onto the floor, causing me to jump. I’m back in my room, with the items from the dragon book scattered across the surface of my desk just as I left them. I bolt out of my room and run down the stairs, nearly colliding with my dad at the very bottom.
“Where’s Rhiannon?” I manage to ask while trying to catch my breath.
“Good evening to you too,” he says, narrowing his small gray eyes, that are very much like mine. “What did you do?”
“Stop asking me that,” I say defensively, “like everything’s my fault.”
“She’s feeding,” he says.
I frown. “On who?”
“Not who, what. Rhiannon hasn’t once killed a human in over thirteen years.”
I chew on the inside of my cheek. “Well, when she comes back, can you tell her to come up to my room? I need
to talk to her.”
“I need to show you something,” he replies, ignoring everything I said.
I shake my head and turn away from him.
“Would you trust me more if I looked like this?”
His voice is different now, and I recognize it. It’s Weylan. My hands curl into fists.
“I can’t believe you lied to me.”
“Ask yourself, honestly,” he says, “would you have stayed if you knew the truth? I was trying to protect you —”
My nails begin to dig into my palms.
“I don’t need to be protected,” I snap at him as I turn around. “What about Apollo? Who was protecting him?” I take a step back, my hands are up in the air, parallel to my chest in surrender. I don’t want to fight. I didn’t come out of my room for a fight. “I can’t talk to you right now. Please — just — just give me my space, okay?”
I expect him to insist. I expect him to tell me that I’ve had enough space, and I should stop acting like a child. I’m preparing myself for the worst but to my surprise, he nods.
The front door opens, and Rhiannon comes through, bundled in a winter coat, wiping her lip with her thumb. I push past my dad and wrap my arms around her, pulling her into a tight hug.
“What’s this for?” she asks, as I feel her arms slowly wrap around me.
“I’m a jerk,” I admit, squeezing her tighter. “Can we go for a walk?”
“Of course,” she says as we part.
I yank my jacket off of the rack and pull it over my arms while following her outside. We venture away from the cabin, feet sinking into the snow. Neither of us say anything for a few minutes and when I turn to face her, she’s looking straight forward, unreadable in her expression.
“I know what you did,” I say, after finding the silence unbearable. “In the Whispering Woods, I mean. I’m an asshole for thinking you were anything but my friend. For thinking you’d kill —”
“You’re human,” she says as she turns her head toward me. Her green eyes are shining, but they’re still dark. “It’s human nature to make mistakes. It’s human nature to be wary, and you don’t know me as well as you know Jubilation. I don’t blame you, Artemis.”
The Midnight Strider (The Chronomancer Chronicles Book 2) Page 1