Moonlit

by Jadie Jones

  I reach a shaking finger closer to her. Just do it. In a rush I close the last few inches between us and clamp my hand around her forearm, willing any fight in me to flow into her body. But grabbing her arm feels like holding on to an electric fence. The hard jolt is ice cold as it flows up my arm and straight to my heart. I clench my jaw and try to pull back, but for several seconds we are bound together by something as strong as it is invisible. I stare at Spera’s face, expecting to see her writhing in the same pain. Except for a quiet shudder, she doesn’t seem to feel a thing.

  And then the pain is gone, evaporating in an instant. I open my hand and sit back, staring at her with my mouth wide open. Did it work? What just happened? As the ringing in my ears subsides, words filter in. Words I can understand. Whatever language they speak here is now familiar and natural in my frazzled brain.

  “Witch! She has brought this famine upon us!” a woman shouts. Her mother lets out a choked plea as another angry chant ripples through the mob, making me regret being able to understand.

  “Wait,” a new voice commands smoothly. Everyone goes silent at the sound, which is eerily familiar to me. The psych patient from the hospital. I wouldn’t forget that voice in a million years. The instant recognition makes the hairs prick on the back of my neck. As I turn to look for confirmation, everyone else in the courtyard drops into a deep bow. The only two left standing are him and me. And now I am certain that he is the same person from the hospital.

  In the daylight he is breathtaking and horrifying, his eyes the same silvery white. My heart leaps involuntarily at the physical similarities between him and Lucas. The same towering stature. Wide set shoulders. Capable hands. An unwanted shiver slinks down my spine. He is not Lucas, I remind myself, reprimanding the unwanted flutter beneath my ribs. And if Maris is right, he’s also a thousand years old.

  He runs one of those capable, pale hands down the length of his black cloak and then draws the hood over his thick black hair before he steps from the shadows and into the unchecked afternoon sun. Panic floods my veins as he glides fluidly toward us, but his white eyes are locked on Spera.

  “Who is he?” I whisper.

  “They call him Asher. The people here think he is a prophet,” my guide says. She raises her chin in a silent salute of defiance. But a fearful tremor claims her shoulders. Her eyes dart to mine, likely assessing whether or not I’d noticed it. Our tense silence feeds off itself, multiplying in the meager space between us.

  Asher towers over Spera. His long shadow covers her completely.

  “Have mercy, I beg of you! She is just a girl,” her mother pleads with him. “At least see if she can be saved.”

  “I will do as you have asked, good woman, as your spirit is clean of sins against the gods.” His deep voice reverberates throughout the courtyard, stilling any movement in the crowd. He closes his eyes and stares at the heavens for several seconds. Bathed in sunlight, his face is white as snow. “Show me what lies within the girl,” he commands to the sky.

  I draw in a breath as he swoops down to one knee in front of Spera and lifts her dirty chin with his hands. Her black eyes stare straight into his. The fear coiled within my belly now seems to belong to me alone.

  “I can save this child,” Asher bellows and turns to face the silenced mass. “I can free her from the demons that hold her body hostage. There is no need to end her life this day.” The crowd roars in celebration. But a satisfied twitch in Asher’s mouth makes me feel sick.

  “What did he see?” I whisper to my guide.

  “Nothing,” she bares her teeth around the word. My eyes move back to Asher, studying everything about him: the marbled smoothness of his skin, the lean muscles that rope his forearms, the way his fingers curl when he speaks. But his eyes, burning and chilling at the same time, command my attention the most. They give nothing away and yet say everything each time he unknowingly fixes them on me: he will have his way.

  “Thank you for your mercy,” her parents sob, collapsing against their restraints.

  “She must come with me so that I may cleanse her spirit, you understand.” He bows his head in a show of sympathy.

  He saved Spera from certain death, but at what price?

  “Whatever it takes, please!”

  Spera’s eyes silently plead with her parents, but they look only at Asher. I see everything she’s trying to tell them. And it boils down to one simple thing: she would rather die. Even though we stand a few feet apart, her contempt for Asher rolls off in waves of heat that brand the side of my arm.

  “I must take her this very moment,” Asher says, as if he’s offering them a choice. What choice? Watch her die or let him take her away? What choice is that? Spera’s sentiments take root within me as I watch their exchange unfold.

  “Anything,” her father agrees. “Anything to save her.”

  “I will send word of her progress. I will keep her safe,” Asher says with a sad smile. “But she can never return.”

  “We know,” her mother says, fighting to keep the devastation from her voice. “May we please say goodbye?”

  “Of course.” Asher gestures to two men standing guard. They pull daggers from their belts and cut Spera’s parents unceremoniously from their restraints. The instant the ropes drop from them, they rush to their daughter’s side and cover her with their arms and their tears. She stares vacantly over their shoulders, and I wish with everything inside of me that I could beg them to pull back and look at her face, to look in her eyes and see what she can’t say to them out loud.

  “Take this, dear Spera,” her mother says as she fumbles at the back of her neck. She straightens and holds her hand out. A silver horseshoe dangles from a leather cord. She fastens it around Spera’s neck and puts a trembling palm over it. “This is my most precious possession. Keep it with you and you will never be alone.”

  I choke back a sob and clutch at the empty space where the necklace should be. How could I have left it? If only I’d known what it really meant. Where it really came from. A flash of anger at Vanessa fans heat across my collar, but I ball my hands into fists and reason it away. She didn’t know what it meant either. She was only trying to keep it safe.

  “It is time to leave,” my guide says as we watch them prepare Spera for transport.

  The black of transition is there and gone in the same second. I blink and am surrounded by red rock and blue sky, which stretch uncontested to each horizon. My guide stands at the very edge of a steep peak, peering down into the chasm below. I move quickly to her side and follow her gaze. A small caravan tracks westward, the slow procession lead by two men. They’re huge. They appear human, but I’ve never seen someone so tall. Yes, you have. Lucas. The thought of him makes my heart leap in my chest. He must be here. How else did he get that necklace?

  My eyes wander over the rest of the struggling party. Behind the leaders trail twenty people marching in pairs, one gigantic man nearly identical to the first two and one wisp of a girl. From this distance any of the men could be Lucas, and any of the girls could be Spera. The girls are tethered together at their waists and their legs are bound with shackles. As they pass beneath our vantage point, their features become more distinct. Spera is in the last pair. She doesn’t look up, but she doesn’t have to. I know that it’s her. I can feel it.

  Is Lucas here? He’ll keep her safe. I scan the line again. But the men are harder to tell apart. Metal vests of armor cover their torsos and lengths of belted, burgundy fabric fall halfway to their knees. Copper-colored sword blades are slung over their backs.

  “Who are the men?”

  “They are Asher’s guards.”

  “They work for him?”

  “They live for him,” she says with a faint growl. Her answer makes my stomach clench. Lucas is one of them? He lives for Asher?

  “What are they doing?”

  “They are escorting these candidates to Asher’s fortress.” Escorting seems a wholly inappropriate word for what is happening on the ca
nyon floor.

  “How long have they been walking like this?”

  “Weeks. There were thirty girls when they started.”

  “What happened to the rest?” I regret the question as soon as I ask it. Only one answer makes sense.

  “He only needs six candidates.”

  “Candidates for what?”

  She answers my question with a withering stare. I press my lips into a firm line and quietly study Spera’s every movement. She and I are really the same? It had seemed so clear in the courtyard. But maybe it was just my need to protect someone being unfairly attacked. Not that she wanted anyone to protect her. That’s something I can relate to.

  The girl directly ahead of Spera collapses to her side. Dust billows up in a rust-colored cloud as her body falls broadside to the ground. I gasp in disbelief as her guard drags her to her feet by her hair. Spera trips in her shackles as the motion ahead of her yanks at her bony frame. I steel myself for whatever cruel excuse for help Spera’s guard is going to offer her. But he quickly shoots out his massive arm and steadies her before she loses her balance. He stares at her for several seconds, as if assessing her condition. As if he cares about her.

  “Lucas?”

  “There is more for you to see. We are done here,” my guide says and takes my hand.

  “Was it him?” My words are lost in the transition, still echoing over the endless desert we’ve left behind.

  19 Scars

  This new memory is so dark that at first I think we’ve gotten stuck, suspended in time somewhere. As my eyes adjust to the dreary surroundings, part of me wishes we had; that we’d gone anywhere else instead of this gloomy place. Collecting moisture drips from a gray, rounded ceiling. We must be in some kind of tunnel or cave. But it’s obviously manmade. The edges are too smooth, too deliberate. A rotten odor makes me reluctant to inhale the damp air as we walk through shallow mud along a meager stream.

  The cylindrical hallway opens ahead, letting in a scant amount of light. We step down into a dank cellar. The floors are still muddy and the stone roof hangs even closer to our heads. It reminds me of the coffin we bought for Dad’s memorial service. When no one was watching, I had slipped inside and closed the lid. That kind of darkness is crushing. It’s a thief, snuffing out chances and hopes and tomorrows. And this feels the same: not just that there’s no way out, but that no one expects you to try.

  “What is this place?” I ask, failing to stop the shudder that forces my shoulders to shake beneath its sickly grip.

  “Asher carved a holding chamber in the base of a mountain.”

  “By himself?”

  “Certainly not. He has more than enough help in this.” She’s not just talking about the chamber.

  The sound of something stirring on the wet floor draws my eye farther down the hall. Just a few feet ahead of us, the solid stone wall recedes. The opening is striped with thick metal bars. A tiger turns tight circles in the small enclosure. It hisses in frustration and wheels again. The next five cages are filled with five more large cats, different only in their species. The rage and confusion flashing in their wild eyes is identical. Part of me wants to walk as close as possible to the opposite wall. The other part is searching for something to pick their locks.

  “What is he doing with these animals?”

  “He has matched each animal with a candidate.” He only needs six, her earlier answer echoes in my mind. Six animals. Six candidates. Did Spera make it?

  “Is Spera—”

  “Would you really wish this life for her? For yourself?” She cuts me off, her words like a slap in the face.

  “That’s not what I meant,” I stammer, bringing a hand to my cheek as if they’d actually left a physical mark.

  “You would not be here if she wasn’t.”

  I start to offer an apology but she waves me off. “He is transfusing each girl’s blood with her match. Human souls are very powerful, more powerful than any other living creature. But human blood is thin and ordinary. For Asher to succeed in his quest, he must find the perfect match between a Vires blood and a Vires soul.”

  I wait for her to say more, but she presses her lips into a firm line and motions me ahead of her. Human fingers wrap around the next set of bars. They’re so thin that the only thing left between the dank air and the bones is a filmy layer of skin. I hold my breath as I step to the front of the cage. A girl’s head hangs low between her skeletal arms. She’s so still that at first I think she died in this position. But her back rises and falls in shallow quivers that barely disturb the thin fabric of her dress.

  “Is he starving them?”

  “Yes. He needs to keep them as close to death as possible.”

  “Why?”

  “The body must be truly hungry or it will reject the transformation.”

  “What kind of transformation?”

  “The physical body of the final candidate will be turned into an Unseen. Replacing their blood is the first step. But the transformation is much more than that. Watch; he’s about to feed them.”

  Six guards enter through an arched opening at the other end of the wet aisle. My heart leaps in the hope that Lucas is with them. But as they walk in single file, all I notice is their hands, which are holding different pieces of some kind of deer. Blood drips from the severed ends of the obviously fresh kill. He can’t be here. He wouldn’t stand to be a part of this. Would he? I turn away as they begin heaving body parts into each cage.

  The low cellar fills with growls. What is making that noise? As if to give me an answer, the first girl pounces on a severed hindquarter and glowers unknowingly at me as she guards her bloody meal. She bares her teeth and snarls a warning before tearing a piece of skin off. My stomach lurches in protest, making me gag on my own spit. The sounds grow louder and more intense as the others begin to gorge themselves. Tearing turns into smacking, and then to crunching, which is by far the worst, as bones crack between their famished jaws.

  I push my fingers into my ears, desperate to dull the manic sounds, and stare straight ahead. Most of the guards don’t cast as much as a glance at the imprisoned candidates before marching back down the aisle. But the last one lingers. He checks the locks on each iron cage as the others leave. His long black hair falls like a curtain, hiding his profile.

  Lucas? I hold my breath and will him to look at me. But he doesn’t. In fact he seems so lost in thought that he doesn’t seem to notice anything around him. Not that he could see you anyway, Tanzy, I chastise myself. He checks the lock on the last cage, and then kneels in front of the crude bars.

  “Spera,” he whispers and reaches out for her.

  It is him! I marvel at the warmth that spreads over me by the sound of that name in his voice. But the recognition comes at a cost; he is no longer just the man who loves Spera. He’s also the man who serves Asher. I tiptoe down the muddy aisle and find a vantage point just behind Lucas’s shoulder. As soon as I put eyes on Spera, I wish I’d stayed where I was. She is weaker than the rest, as close to death as I’ve ever seen any living thing. Her black eyes barely flicker at him as she raises her head from her knees.

  “I brought you something,” Lucas says so quietly that I can barely hear him. Slowly, she lowers herself on all fours and crawls across the wet floor of the low slung cage without acknowledging the untouched deer leg in the corner. Although the thought comes as a shock, I can’t help but wish that she would eat it.

  Exhausted from moving the short distance, Spera leans forward and rests the side of her face in his big, open palm. All of the doubts I had about Lucas disappear as he gently strokes her cheek with his other hand. The desperation in his eyes pinches my throat and makes it hard for me to swallow.

  He reaches inside his belt and retrieves a tuft of bread. “Do you want this?” Without a word, she plucks it quickly from his hand and devours it. “I’m sorry it’s not more.”

  Every time he speaks he draws me a little closer to him. I can’t help but wonder if he can feel
my breath on his bare shoulder. But now that he’s so close, something about him looks wrong. With a start I realize that the side of his face is perfectly smooth. What gave him those scars?

  “Are you thirsty?” he asks. She dips her chin lower to her chest. His jaw sets with worry as he turns from her and cups water from the underground stream. Taking care not to spill a drop, he brings his hands to her dirty face and holds them perfectly still as she laps up every bit of water. Up close, she looks much older than she did in the village courtyard.

  “How long has she been here?” I ask my guide.

  “Only a year. Asher’s process is very hard on the body.”

  “What happened to the others?”

  “Asher has brought them to the brink of death over and over. Sometimes the body will continue to fight back. Sometimes it won’t. He’s weeding out the weaker ones.” Horrified, my eyes move back to Spera, who is clearly the weakest of the six remaining girls. Is she next?

  “Did that bring you any strength?” Lucas whispers. She nods, her eyes already a little brighter. “Could you run? If I give you a way, do you think you have enough strength to run from here?”

  “Perhaps, but Lucas—” She stares at him with wide eyes.

  “No,” he cuts her off. “When I tell you to, you run as fast and as far as you can and don’t worry for me. I will find you somehow. You have my word. But I can’t see you in here for one more moment.” Her chin trembles and her eyes drop to the soil. “Promise me.”

  “I promise,” she rasps.

  I promise, I catch myself mentally calling out to them both. I don’t yet know what my promise is for, but I know what it’s made of. Hightowers don’t go back on our word. The spell is broken as the other guards lumber back through the archway. Quick as lightning, Lucas leaps to his feet and smashes his open palm into the cold bars. Spera screeches like she’s been burned.