by R. A. Rock
“And if we can’t open the chest and get the Crown of Visions to read the Scroll, then we can’t end the Severance. And they’ll be able to capture us and kill us. The whole point of doing it this week was so that the Severance would be ended before they could hurt us.”
“I know. So we have to open the chest. But we can’t with our bodies like this.” Finn indicated his ghost-like appearance.
Of course, there were other things that they couldn’t do with their bodies like this but Finn wasn’t going to voice his disappointment on that front because it would only make him look shallow. He was disappointed, nonetheless.
But there would be worse things to deal with if they didn’t get the crown and translate the Scroll, so he pushed all his frustrated energy into figuring that out.
“We have to open the chest and get ourselves changed back,” he said. “Because even if we opened the chest like this, what could we do with the crown if we’re ghosts?”
“That’s true, but one thing at a time,” Tess said. “How can we get ourselves changed back?”
“No idea,” Finn said. “But Izzie did mention before I left that he thought we’d need the King or Dark Queen to fix us. Someone with their kind of power.”
“Shadows take me,” Tessa said, shaking her head. “Well, I’m not asking them.”
“Me neither. Never mind that, then.” Finn ran a hand through his hair that he couldn’t feel. “Let’s focus on opening the chest, then, since that seems more manageable.”
“How are we going to do that?”
“Well, we need someone who can actually pick things up to get it out for us and try to open it.”
“The list of people we can trust in this castle is very short,” Tess said.
“True,” Finn said, thinking hard. “But there’s someone who owes us a favor.”
Tess frowned and then her face cleared. “Lorcan.”
“Do you trust him?”
“With my life.”
“Let’s go find him then,” Finn said, walking through the wall. “Time is not on our side.”
Lorcan turned the chest this way and that, inspecting it.
“I have no idea how to open this,” Lorcan said, glancing at Tess and Finn. “I don’t see how you can expect me to do this.”
“You have a much better chance of doing it, seeing as you can actually touch it,” Finn said, turning his almost invisible hands palms up.
“What exactly happened to you, anyway?” Lorcan said, squinting at their see-through bodies.
“Long story, Lorcan,” Tess said with a shake of her head. “I’ll tell you another time.”
“And what’s so important that you need to get out of this chest, anyway?” Lorcan said.
“Too many questions,” Finn said, his face forbidding.
“Look,” Tess said. “We did you a favor, helping you find Runa, right?”
“A favor which cost us dearly, I might add,” Finn said, looking annoyed.
“And now we need you to do us a favor,” Tess said, her tone reasonable. “It’s as simple as that. But you can’t ask so many questions, Lorcan. Please?”
“Fine. I’ll help. But only because you’ve always been a good friend to me, Tessa. And because you helped me with Runa. Otherwise, I wouldn’t do it. Obviously, you two are involved in some messed-up, Shadow-cursed business.”
“Fine,” Tess said. She didn’t care why he helped them as long as he did.
“So, what do you want me to do? Just tell me and I’ll do it.”
They all stared at the chest.
Lorcan glanced back and forth between Tess and Finn.
“You don’t know what you want me to do?” he said, not impressed.
“We don’t know how to open it,” Finn said, clearly getting irritated with Lorcan’s superior attitude but trying to keep a lid on his temper. “We need your hands and, if you have a brain, we could use that too. We need to figure this out. It’s of the utmost importance.”
“Fine,” Lorcan said.
“And insulting us is not helping, by the way, in case you didn’t know that.”
“Fine,” Lorcan repeated and the two men glared at each other.
Tess gave Finn a stop-antagonizing-the-only-person-who-is-willing-to-help-us look. Sure, Lorcan was going along with all of this but he could just as easily change his mind and then where would they be?
Tess started speaking her thoughts out loud in hopes of getting them all on the same page and somehow figuring out a way of opening this stupid chest.
“Obviously, it’s a magic lock because there’s nothing keeping it locked or even shut physically, and yet it won’t open. So, it has to be magic that’s keeping the contents of the chest safe inside.”
“What about the Keeper?” Finn said to Tess. “What does he know? Use the ring.”
“The Keeper?” Lorcan looked confused, and annoyed that he was confused, because they wouldn’t tell him anything. “What ring?”
“The less you know, the safer you’ll be,” Tess told him and that surprised him and shut him up.
Tess reached to activate the ring her aunt had given her to access the Keeper’s memories. Then she stopped. She wasn’t wearing the ring. And she was a ghost anyway. How was she going to turn any rings? Especially since there wasn’t a ring on her finger anyway.
But as she thought about the chest, she realized the memories were there. She could remember everything the Keeper had known about the chest and she hadn’t needed the ring.
“We’ll need a lot of power,” she told Finn and Lorcan. “The King himself sealed it, so it will take a Shadow-ton of magic to open it.”
“You didn’t use the ring,” Finn said.
Tess shook her head. “I just remembered on my own.”
Lorcan was keeping quiet but Tess could tell that he wanted to ask a million questions.
“The spell keeping your memories and his separate must be degrading,” Finn speculated.
“Maybe,” Tess said, refocusing on the problem at hand. “Of course, we don’t have the kind of power it would require to open the chest, even though I now know how to do it. And we’re certainly not asking anyone who does have that kind of power to help us.”
The three of them were quiet, thinking.
“Shadows take me,” Tess said suddenly into the silence and Lorcan flinched at her cursing. “What are we going to do? Where can we get that kind of power?”
“There’s no way. Neither of us has enough magic to open that.”
Tess froze.
“Neither of us alone has enough magic,” she whispered.
“What?” Lorcan said with a scowl.
“We shouldn’t,” Finn said, his expression wary. “It’s too soon since the last time. Maybe we can’t even do it when we’re ghosts. How would we—”
“Are you talking about Uniting?” Lorcan said, looking decidedly uncomfortable. “And you’ve done it before?
“We don’t do it to get high, Lorcan,” Tess explained. “We did it the first time to escape a monster lair.”
“I’m not sure I can be a party to this,” Lorcan said, standing up. “I should go.”
“No, please,” Tess said, putting out her ghostly hand. “If Finn and I Unite, we’ll have the magical power we need to open the chest, but someone still has to lift the lid of the chest physically when the magic lock is opened. Please, Lorcan?”
Lorcan pressed his lips together and sat down again. “Fine, but I’m not happy about this.”
“Duly noted,” Finn said, with a roll of his eyes that Lorcan couldn’t see.
Finn and Tess faced each other.
“Now how do we do this without physical bodies?” Finn said.
“We still have physical bodies. It’s just that we’re so thin that we can pass through things. But we can see our bodies, so that means there’s something there.”
“Good point.”
“So, we just do like we have before.”
They sat down an
d put their palms together, concentrating to keep the magical points touching, so to speak.
“Ready?” Finn said.
“Ready,” Tess answered.
They both closed their eyes and Tess willed her Starlight to Unite with Finn’s. She felt the now familiar sensation of their magic merging. When they were fully United, the euphoria filled her entire being and she almost forgot what they were trying to do.
“Uh, hello?” Lorcan said loudly, and they startled apart.
The magic link stayed strong, though. They didn’t need the physical contact to maintain it. Their Starlight would only separate when they willed it to do so.
“Right,” Tess said, making an effort to focus. “Now this time, we’ll need to channel not only our Starlight but the energy of the Stars as well.”
“You can pull the Starlight that’s all around us in and use it?” Lorcan said, looking more intrigued and less appalled.
“Yes,” Tess said and Finn nodded, probably guessing that she knew this from the Keeper’s memories. “We just have to will it, Finn.”
“Got it.”
“Put the chest between us, Lorcan,” Tess said, scooting back so there was a space between her and Finn. He set the small wooden chest on the floor. “Let’s hold hands on top of the chest, Finn.”
They put their insubstantial hands over the chest, holding them in the correct position.
“It’ll help channel the energy,” she told the men. “And we open ourselves to the energy of the Stars and then just will the chest to open, sending as much energy as we can into it.”
“Let’s do it,” Finn said, his face serious. He closed his eyes. Tess closed her eyes, too. Then she remembered something.
“Lorcan,” Tess said, her face solemn. “If by any chance we start to glow and you can’t wake us, get out of here. Because it means we’re going to explode and you’ll die too.”
“What?” Lorcan said, anxiety all over his face. “No. You shouldn’t do this.”
“We have to. It’s just that… Uniting is forbidden for a reason.” Tess looked troubled. “But I’m sure it’ll be fine.”
“Tessa,” he said, obviously worried about her.
“Don’t worry, Lorcan,” she said, trying to heed her own words. Then she closed her eyes. She opened herself to the energy of the Stars and felt a waterfall of Starlight blast through her. The pain from the magical pounding nearly knocked her unconscious.
“It’s too much,” she wailed.
“I’ll close the opening,” Finn said and she could feel him nudging it closed. She shoved on it too until the Starlight was back to a reasonable flow.
“Right, now let’s send it into the chest,” she said, feeling shaky after the magic had nearly killed her in the first few seconds. They both took the flow of Starlight and directed it into the chest.
“Let’s open the flow as much as we can without it killing us,” Finn suggested. “You’ll have to channel it because you have the Keeper’s memories and you know what to do. Can you handle it?”
“Just do it.” Tess was scared and didn’t want to, but she wasn’t going to let that stop her. This was too important.
Finn slowly pulled on the edge of the opening through which all of the Starlight in creation was flowing and more energy came through. He tugged it open a little more. And then more. It started to ache throughout all of Tessa’s nonexistent body.
“More,” she whispered, bearing the pain as best she could.
He drew the opening wider and more Starlight flowed through her, burning the magical channels in her body and scraping her energetic body raw.
“Is it opening?” Finn asked Lorcan.
“No. I don’t see anything.”
She sensed rather than heard him touching the chest.
“Nothing,” he said.
“Send more,” she told Finn.
“But Tess, what if—”
“It’s no good if we can’t open the chest,” she said. “Nothing matters if we can’t open the chest.”
Finn didn’t answer. He only extended the opening even more so that the energy started gushing through again. Tess felt as though she was being pounded beneath a huge waterfall again. She felt that the pain was all she was.
“Anything?” Finn said, his voice sounding desperate.
“Still nothing.” Lorcan’s voice was afraid now. “You have to stop. You’re going to kill her.”
“No,” she said, and she could hear the pain in her voice. “Don’t stop. Send more. I think we’re almost there.”
Tears were pouring down her cheeks and she was rocking back and forth. She wanted to scream but she held it back. If she could only hold on for a little longer, they would do it.
Finn reluctantly ripped it wide open. As wide as it had been at the beginning. Tess did scream then, loud and long. She couldn’t help it. She was coming to pieces. She had never had anything hurt so much ever. Not even when Perdira had sent magic through her in the swamp.
“I have to stop,” Finn shouted.
“Not yet,” Lorcan yelled over Tessa’s screaming. “It’s opening.”
Tess continued to shriek as loudly as she could, since it almost seemed to help with the pain.
“Stop now,” Lorcan yelled. “It’s done.”
Finn shut the opening so fast that it was like a punch in the face and Tess flew backward from the shot of energy, hitting the wall and collapsing on the floor. Then he untwisted his Starlight from hers so quickly that it made her feel dizzy and nauseated, in addition to the intense ache that still filled her entire being.
“You did it, Tess,” Lorcan said, his voice relieved. “You opened it.”
Tess couldn’t answer.
She felt nothing but agony.
She was going to die. She knew it.
This is finally the end.
And with that thought, she blacked out.
Chapter 27
When Tessa opened her eyes, she was in a cell.
A cell in the Dark Queen’s dungeons.
She jolted up and grabbed ahold of the bars, grimacing at the greasy yet gritty feel of them. And that was when she realized that her body was substantial again. What the Chasm? How had that happened?
Tess had no idea what time it was and there was no way of knowing because it was always the same dim, grey murky light in here that came from some eternally misfiring luminescence orbs.
She rattled the bars of her cell as hard as she could, but they were locked up tight. There was no getting out of here, Tess knew. The cells were located below the castle proper but before the wyrm tunnels began. A thick layer of earth separated the dungeons from the castle, with there being no hope of anyone hearing the screams.
Not only were there sturdy bars, locks, and guards that kept the prisoners in but there were also wards on the whole place. Ransetta wasn’t about to lose these prisoners she hadn’t been able to capture otherwise. It was a death sentence to be locked in here. Tessa knew that because she had once been the person locking people up in the Dark Queen’s dungeons as the Captain of the Guard.
No one ever escaped. Never.
So what was she doing here?
How had she ended up in the dungeons?
All she remembered was that she and Finn had been Uniting to try and open the chest. And they had done it. After that, she couldn’t remember a thing until she had woken up here.
What in the Chasm was going on?
She hung her head, dread filling her. The Dark Queen must have had her captured when she was unconscious.
“I have to get out of here,” she muttered to herself.
“Give it up, Tess,” Nat’s voice said and Tessa’s eyes snapped up. Nat was in the cell across from her. Had she always been there? Tess hadn’t been paying attention to anything except her own situation and hadn’t noticed Nat sitting there. “You know how hopeless it is. You used to put people in these dungeons.”
There was definitely an accusing tone to Nat’s voice and Te
ss felt guilty once again for all the things she had done as a spy in the Dark Court.
Her friend was dirty, her hair lanky as if she had been here a long time. How many days had it been? Tess tried to remember when Nat had been captured. But everything felt hazy and she wondered if it were the aftereffects of Uniting and channeling so much magic.
“Yes, and it’s your fault we’re here, Tessa,” came Isadore’s voice. She looked at the cell across and to the right of Nat’s. She felt really confused now. Had Izzie been sitting there all this time and she hadn’t noticed him? “If you and Finn hadn’t tried to end the Severance, all of us would be free right now and dancing at the Ball. Instead, we’re prisoners. And who knows what the Dark Queen will do with us when the Truce spell ends.”
“Izzie, what happened?” Tess said, moving to the corner of her cell to speak to him.
“After you collapsed, Ransetta’s guards broke in,” Finn said, and she whipped her head to the left. He was in the cell next to hers. What? She felt like he hadn’t been there until he had spoken a moment before, but that wasn’t possible.
“Oh no,” she said, going to the wall her cell shared with Finn’s. “What about Lorcan?”
“Over here.” Lorcan’s voice came from Izzie’s cell. He was sitting on the floor and he held his hand up as if she were taking attendance.
Tess felt her eyes filling with tears. She sniffed and hung her head. She had failed to get the crown, translate the Scroll, and end the Severance. Plus, she had taken everyone she cared about down with her. It was everything she had never wanted to happen.
“I am so sorry,” she said, her voice breaking.
“I bet you are,” said a voice that was somehow as sweet as it was galling.
“Ransetta,” Tess said, lifting her head to see the Dark Queen sauntering down the hall in a slinky violet dress that matched her eyes.
“Tessa Callahan.” She said Tessa’s name as though she were so disappointed in her. “I had such high hopes for you. Too bad you turned out to be a traitor. But I’m going to enjoy killing you. Slowly. Piece by piece.”
“Ransetta,” she said, her face hard. “If you’re going to kill me, then so be it. But let these people go. They haven’t done anything wrong. They don’t deserve any punishment.”