Ouroboros (Seven Relics Saga Book 1)

by Brea Essex

  I cursed the need for our slow going out loud.

  “Why exactly do we have to hurry?” Zac asked.

  “Someone stole your body while you were out on a mission,” I informed him in a clipped tone. “We just found it—here—and got you back into it.”

  I didn’t see his expression, since he was crawling slightly behind me. “What are you talking about?” he asked, sounding bewildered. “How do you know all this? Just who are you exactly?”

  “I’ll explain once we’re free of here. You gotta trust me, okay?”

  He mumbled something sounding like assent.

  Glancing back, I saw that he was still following me. Good. He might have questions, but at least he trusted me enough to do as I asked. Some part of his mind must have remembered me.

  We continued to speed-crawl down the hall. Finally I spied a line of light near the floor. “There’s the outside door,” I called to Zac, hoping he was still following me. I could barely see now as more smoke filled the hall.

  Reaching up, I clawed for the doorknob. A searing pain ripped through my palm. A stifled a scream and jerked my hand away. “Oh my God!” I hissed.

  “What happened?” Zac voice came from near my ear.

  “The door handle is excruciatingly hot from the fire!”

  “Hold on. Let me.”

  I couldn’t see what he was doing, but I felt a rush of cool air over my head. A sharp clang echoed through the corridor, and the door sprung open.

  We rushed out of the opening. I sucked air in sharply, forcing the sweet oxygen into my smoke-filled lungs in relief. Beside me, Zac was sprawled out on the ground, his chest heaving as he also attempted to catch his breath.

  “Are you all right?” I asked him, crouching over him in concern.

  He nodded, then began to cough. His entire body was wracked with spasms. “Jeeze, I sound like I’m trying to cough up my lungs,” he quipped. He started laughing, which caused him to choke and the coughing started up again.

  “What the hell did you do?” I asked him, curious as to how he succeeded in getting the door open.

  “I kicked the door, just like the other one. I got lucky. This one was heavier than the one inside.”

  Wow. He was stronger than I thought. I wanted to laugh at his confession, but there wasn’t time. Glancing around, I noticed that we were still out in the open. “We have to get under cover.”

  “Will you tell me what’s going on now?” he asked after he finally caught his breath.

  I shook my head. “Not yet; sorry. Once we’re safe, I’ll explain everything.” He scowled at me. “I promise. I just need you to trust me for a few more minutes.”

  He pushed his hands against the ground, heaving himself into a sitting position. He crossed his legs and stared up at me. “Why should I trust you? Yeah, I know you were right about the fire. I owe you my life. But getting me out of a freak fire isn’t going to be enough for me to just run off with you without asking any questions. Although… you are pretty hot.” He winked at me.

  “You’ve saved me more than once. I’d do anything to save you. Look, you’re in danger here. We both are. You’re back in your body now. We have to get out of here before someone comes. We still don’t know who stole your body. And we need to get going, to get the Seven Relics before The Necrovorst…”

  “Whoa, whoa, whoa!” Zac jumped to his feet in a fluid motion. It was an impressive sight. It was one thing to see him do crazy feats when he was still in spirit form. Seeing the way he moved when he was actually in his body—it was entrancing. “Hold on, here. Did you say The Necrovorst? You’re trying to tell me that I’m going up against him?”

  I nodded. “Yes. We know who he is, too. Besides trying to find your body, you and I have been on a sort of quest to find the Seven Relics before The Necrovorst does.”

  His eyes bulged. “We know who he is? I thought no one knew his identity.”

  “Well, you and I do. He kidnapped my twin sister, and now they’re married. He’s brainwashed her and forced him to marry her in some sort of bizarre ritual—one that you said we couldn’t stop because she’s expecting his child.”

  Zac buried his face in his hands. “This is bad. This is really bad.” He stopped at looked down at me. He stood so close to me, yet I didn’t dare reach out and touch him until he remembered me… and what we meant to each other. To do so might break his trust, which I didn’t dare break now.

  “Yeah, I know. So can we get out of here before someone else notices the flames and the alarms? We can’t risk anyone finding us. We need to get to Vancouver. I promise I’ll explain everything on the way.”

  As I watched, his aura appeared and changed from a dark orange to a bright green. Where the hell did that come from? I had seen that guy's aura when I almost drowned, but I thought it was a fluke. Had I discovered a new power? He heaved a heavy sigh. “All right. I’ll trust you. For now.” His eyes narrowed slightly, but the smile on his face belied his warning.

  Immense relief flooded my body. He might not have remembered me yet, but at least he was willing to trust me, to follow me. “Come on. There’s a car parked over there.” I gestured at the thicket of trees where we had left our rental car. “We’ll drive back to Victoria, then take the ferry over to the mainland.”

  He nodded in agreement, and we jogged toward the trees. I glanced back once to make sure Zac was, in fact, following. He was close behind me. I set my sights back on the trees.

  “I’ll drive,” I announced when we reached the car.

  He shrugged. “Fine by me, as long as you explain while we’re driving.”

  It took us over two hours to drive back to Victoria, which gave me plenty of time to remind Zac of everything that had happened to us over the past few months. I kept waiting to see if something I said would spark his memory, but nothing did. Our conversation got put on hold while we returned the rental car and purchased tickets for the ferry.

  When the ferry finally came, we went out to stand at the front railing, just as we had done on the way from Washington.

  “Is there anything else major that you’re leaving out?” Zac asked, staring across the water.

  I hesitated. “Yes… When you found me in the hospital, I didn’t know what I was.”

  He turned toward me, a look of confusion on his face. “What are you?”

  “I’m a necromancer.”

  He barked a short laugh. “Well, that certainly explains a lot! No wonder you were able to see me when I wasn’t in my body.”

  “Right. Anyway, I was in the hospital because of head trauma from a fall. You had been searching for someone that could see you, help you. When I came into my powers, you saw my light.”

  His eyes widened. “Wait. I remember that. Your light was like a beacon in the darkness. It was beautiful, reassuring. It gave me hope.” He reached out and caught a lock of my hair between his fingers. He twisted it and it gleamed gold in the fading light. “Just like this, only brighter.”

  Understanding dawned slowly on his face. He stared at me in wonder. “Rhiannon—I remember! I remember everything.” Releasing my hair, he caught me up in his arms. “It feels so good to hold you again—really hold you, not like it was when we were both in the spirit realm,” he whispered against my hair. “Have I ever told you how I felt when I first saw your light? I had seen the light of necromancers before, but none shone as bright as yours. It was the most beautiful thing I had seen… until I found you in the hospital and laid eyes on your face.”

  I wanted to weep with relief. He had his memories back! “I’m so glad you remember.”

  “Now we can concentrate on more important things.”

  “Yep. Like stopping Typhon.”

  He nodded and cupped my chin, tilting my face up toward him. “And being together,” he whispered before he leaned down and pressed his lips against mine.

  Eighteen

  When we reached the mainland, we had to rent another car to in order to get to Vancouver. It was a s
hort drive into the city, but it took us a while to locate the airport.

  I left the car with the appropriate rental company, and we headed inside. The lines were long, and we waited impatiently.

  “We need a direct flight to Cairo,” Zac told the employee behind the ticket counter when we finally reached it.

  The woman typed quickly on her keyboard. “I’m sorry. It looks as though there are no direct flights to Cairo. However, we do have flights that route through London or Frankfurt, Germany.”

  “We’ll take the Germany one,” Zac told her without hesitation. “There are some great places to sight-see there,” he said to me.

  “Are you on your honeymoon?” the agent asked with a smile.

  “Oh no, not quite yet,” I answered her.

  “Oh? But soon?” she pressed.

  Zac stared in confusion, then his eyes widened. “We, ah, haven’t set a date yet.”

  She smiled and nodded as she rang up our tickets. When she told us the amount, Zac sputtered a little in shock, but reached for his wallet. I beat him to it, sliding my credit card across the counter as he fumbled in his pockets.

  “You didn’t have to do that,” he muttered as we walked toward our departure gate, tickets in hand.

  “I know. But I figured you might not remember where you kept your wallet after not being in your body for so many months,” I said quietly, laughing.

  He didn’t seem to think it was very funny. We fell silent as we wound around the people crowding the airport.

  “Rhiannon?” he asked quietly.

  “Yeah?”

  “We’re engaged, right?”

  I stopped and turned to look at him. “Well… yes. You did ask me to marry you.” I paused. “Are you rethinking it, now that you’re back in your body?”

  “What? No! No, of course not. Some of my memories aren’t quite clear. I technically existed in another dimension for a long time. I just wanted to be sure that our engagement wasn’t a dream. Of course I still want to marry you…” He trailed off, glancing down at my left hand. “I didn’t give you a ring?”

  I shook my head. “No. You said the ring you wanted to give me—your grandmother’s ring—was with your body.”

  His brow furrowed, and he patted his pockets. His search didn’t seem to turn up anything. He took my hand and drew me near the wall, out of the crowd that was currently jostling us. He reached inside his jacket and gave me a relieved look.

  Unzipping an interior pocket, he drew out a small black velvet box. “It’s still here.” He looked down at me, a wistful expression on his face. “This isn’t exactly how I envisioned this happening. An airport isn’t the most romantic place to propose.”

  “Technically, you proposed to me at the top of the Eiffel Tower,” I reminded him. “It was incredibly romantic.”

  “That’s right. I did, didn’t I? So, that’s the story we’ll tell the kids?”

  I laughed. “I promise I won’t tell them that I got my engagement ring in the middle of the Vancouver Airport.”

  He opened the box. He took the ring out, and as he was sliding the ring onto my finger, he suddenly froze. “There is a wraith here.”

  “What? Are you sure?”

  “I’m positive. I have to deal with it.”

  My hand on his forearm stayed him before he ran off. “Zac, you’re still weak. You’ve only been back in your body for a few hours. Are you sure you can handle this?”

  He nodded. “It’s my job. I have to protect whoever it’s after. I can’t just leave them to destruction.”

  “All right,” I said with a heavy sigh. “I don’t like it, but I understand.” I stopped and looked around. “But we need to find a safe place to leave your body, where I can guard it. We can’t risk it being taken again.”

  His eyes grew warm. “I knew I loved you for a reason. Let’s go.” He grabbed my hand, and we raced through the airport, garnering many odd looks as we ran.

  Zac skidded to a stop in front of a plain door with a small glass window. I nearly crashed into him, but I managed to stop just before I plowed into his back. He glanced through the window. “There’s no one in here. If we lock the door, hopefully no one will bother us.”

  He looked around and then turned the knob. It was locked. “I don’t suppose you know an unlocking spell, do you?”

  “Of course.” I placed my finger on the lock. I whispered the words to the spell, and it clicked open. We looked around one more time, then opened the door and slipped inside. I turned the lock after the door closed behind us, then glanced at Zac. “Now what?”

  “Now I go into the spirit dimension and try to find this wraith and save the human it’s targeting. You stay here and guard my body.” He hesitated. “I hate to leave you here unprotected.”

  “I’m not unprotected. I have my spells. Besides, I can see into the spirit dimension also, remember? I’ll be able to see you, as well as the demon—I mean, wraith.”

  “That’s right. You have an advantage that most people don’t have.” He stooped quickly and kissed me. “I’ll be back soon. I promise I’ll be careful. Zayin are strong, especially me. We bounce back quickly. Not many people, even Zayin, could have stood being out of their body as long as I was. Most others would have faded away. I’m resilient. I’ll be fine.”

  He fell silent, concentrating. A bright light began to emanate behind him. “What the hell is that?” I blurted out without thinking.

  Zac looked up at me, and the glow faded. “The light is coming from my tattoo,” he informed me. “It represents the connection between my soul and the spirit realm. It enables me to travel back and forth.”

  “That’s right. You told me that before. I’d just never seen it before. Sorry to interrupt.”

  I stayed silent as the light began to glow from his back again. His body slowly slumped to the floor. I ran over and caught him, helping to lay his limp form out on the ground. “Thank you,” I heard his voice say from above my head.

  Looking up, I saw his spirit standing over me. His crossover into the spirit realm had been a lot faster than I had anticipated. Holding his nearly lifeless form in my arms and seeing his spirit form standing over me was almost more than I could handle.

  “I hate seeing you like this,” I told him. “It’s too soon.”

  He reached down and placed a hand near my shoulder. It hovered over me. “It won’t be like last time. I have you to guard my body. No one will take it, and I’ll be back before you know it. Time moves differently in the spirit realm. This won’t take me long.”

  Before I could respond, he slipped through the wall, leaving me alone with his shallowly breathing body.

  I could hardly handle sitting there, watching his chest barely rise and fall. It reminded me entirely too much of how he had looked when we first found his body in the facility in Bowser earlier that day. What if he couldn’t return to his body this time? Would the spell work again? Of course, there was also always the chance that whatever wraith he went up against would be too strong for him. If he couldn’t fight it, if he couldn’t save the human it was tormenting, there was a good chance that he could be pulled into darkness also.

  So consumed was I by my own dark, morbid thoughts, that I didn’t notice Zac melt through the wall again. His body was covered in shallow gashes; his hair disheveled and caked with what looked like blood mixed with dirt. I slowly lowered his body to the floor from my lap and jumped to my feet.

  “What happened?” I demanded.

  “It was too strong for me,” he gasped. His face was a mix of anger and sorrow. Even in his spirit form, I could see his charcoal grey aura. “I couldn’t save him. I couldn’t save the human that was being attacked.” He slumped down on the ground, next to his body. Covering his hands with his face, he muttered around them, “I’ve failed in my duty.”

  I wished I could pull his hands from his face so I could look him in the eyes. I settled for sliding down on the floor next to him. “Zac, you can’t save everyone.” He
pulled his hands from his face and looked at me. He opened his mouth to say something, but I interrupted him. “I know you’d like to. I know it’s your job to protect people. But unfortunately, sometimes there are things that are stronger than us.”

  He nodded, but didn’t say anything more. We sat in silence for quite sometime. Finally, he spoke up. “I suppose I should get back in my body so we can catch our flight.”

  This time, I remained silent as his spirit returned to his body. Once again, the Ouroboros tattoo glowed on his back, forming the connection. As I watched, his breathing returned to normal and his eyes opened. They were still filled with pain, but at least he had been able to return on his own.

  I helped him to his feet, and we snuck back out of the small room we had been hiding in. We reached our gate with plenty of time to spare.

  Nineteen

  When we landed at the Frankfurt Airport, Zac was instantly on high alert. He leaned over toward me. “There’s a wraith nearby,” he whispered in my ear.

  This again? I glanced around us, hoping none of the nearby passengers had heard him. “Are you sure?” I asked in a low tone.

  He gave me a skeptical look. “Don’t you get it by now? I can always tell when there is one around.”

  “Are you going after it?”

  His silence worried me. We stood and filed out of the plane with the other passengers. “No,” he finally said as we exited through the gate.

  “Zac, you have to. It’s your job, your calling.”

  “I’ve lost my touch, or whatever you want to call it. I was out of my body for too long. It made me weak. I’m useless now,” he said angrily, his voice started to rise.

  “Shhh,” I hushed him. The airport was crowded and loud, but we still couldn’t risk someone accidentally hearing him. It would pose more questions than we could answer. “You’re far from useless. But I don’t understand—when you were out of your body, you were able to fight. What’s different now?”

  We continued to thread our way through the crowd. “I think getting back in my body may have been traumatic for my spirit. It might have weakened me. That’s my only guess.”