Ilyan

by Rebecca Ethington

  It was a beautiful image, especially with the way her hair blew around her. I stopped myself from reaching out and stepped back, hands twitching in need.

  “Yes. Which will take me to my wife,” My heart fluttered at the word on my tongue, the emotion swelling comfortably and I sighed.

  The sound pulled her attention as she turned to face me once more, the calm look now peppered with a dim light and a sigh.

  “Neither.” The word was a stab in my heart. “One will give you knowledge, but take away your power to reach her. The other will give you power, but you will not know where to find her.”

  The eyes of the imposter grew dark, the entire surface plunging into the abyss as she stared into me, the glow from behind her dimming as she lifted her hands, one cradling the fist of the other as the light began to seep through her closed fingers.

  I stared at the light, my body filled with both familiarity and need, that same feral emotion now desperate to jump on her, to take whatever she held and reclaim it as my own.

  “I told you I am small. I am all that is left of a power that was once a great flood.” She opened her hand.

  The light that I had seen behind her was condensed into a pebble in the palm of her hand. The intense glow spread out from her in a flood, surrounding us in an orb that seeped into me, that buzzed through me.

  The strength of my magic clear for the first time.

  As much as the light burned into my mind, as much as it hurt, I couldn’t look away. Pain rattled my mind as the need to seize her, to seize the light, grew. My fingers began to twitch.

  “Your memories are blocked by a Vizamat that as much as I fight, I cannot break. Not alone. I am not strong enough anymore,” She whispered, closing her hand over the light.

  My hand jerked toward the light, desperate to grab it. It was a small motion, but the woman noticed, smiling at me sadly as she once again stepped closer, her hand held between us as lines of light spread from below.

  “You must find Joclyn, Ilyan,” she pleaded as she opened her hand again. The light swelled into the dark, lifting from her palm as it began to pulse with the tiniest fade. “She is your mate, she holds your magic safe.”

  I moved to reach for it again but stopped myself before I touched the tiny thing, the subtle pulses of light stopping me in place.

  “She is the only one who can return what was lost, who can bring back your memories, who can return you to who you once were.”

  Her words were a mumble in the back of my mind, my focus still on the light, on the way it pulsed, on the way it called to me…

  “Ilyan,” she said, her voice a roar.

  I jumped at the sound, at the use of my name, and dropped my hand, staring at her as my heart began to beat like a drum against my chest.

  “You must find her.” Her tone made it clear she was repeating a command. My pride bristled, but I pushed it away, straightening my shoulders as I looked down at the girl.

  “How am I supposed to find someone that I can barely remember?” I asked. I did not even try to keep the gruff desperation from flooding my words.

  Saying it aloud was a pain that I rebelled against. The same longing I had felt for years so much different than what I felt for the still pulsing light, yet it was just as strong. The need for the power the light held and my love for Joclyn was a constriction of loss that made it hard to breathe, the two combining into a hollow in my chest that threatened to devour everything.

  “Do you choose to remember then?” The question caught me off guard.

  Instead of answering, I just stared at her, jaw working as I looked at her and the tiny pebble of magic that hovered above my head. My heart pulled and ached with a need, two separate desires; one fueled in desperation, one fueled by passion.

  I could feel them both. But only one scared me to possess. Only one scared me to lose.

  “I wish to find my wife.” Referring to her as what she was to me was a breath of fresh air. “I would die to see her one last time. To hold her in my arms. To remember her.”

  The imposter smiled, the light in her eyes shining so brightly that for one moment I was sure it was Joclyn, that I had gotten my wish and she had been returned to me.

  It was only a mirage.

  The look left before I could fully draw breath. The wind around her picked up as she opened her hand between us, the tiny ball of light flew back into her hand, pulsing between us again. The rhythm suddenly made sense.

  The pulse of a heart.

  As I watched it, however, I knew that it was not my heart. The beat was not mine, it was not the phantom that stood before me.

  It was her’s.

  “Joclyn,” I gasped, my fingers floating toward the orb again, desperate to touch it, to feel her. She was right there, this tiny piece was connected to her, and she was very much alive.

  “Joclyn will return your magic. She will return your power.” Her voice was soft, but not enough to pull my focus away from the light, from Joclyn’s heart. “I will give you the memories I have of her. Of your life.”

  “Wait…” I tried to interrupt, my hand dropping as her dark eyes pulled me from the light.

  I was not quite sure what was happening, but the way she spoke, the way the pulse of light above my head increased to match my heart rate, something was happening. Something that the feral need in me was screaming at me to stop.

  “They are the keys to finding the other half to your soul.” She continued on, ignoring my single word interruption like it had never happened. “But you must hurry. You are an Ancient, I am not sure what a loss of your magic will do to you. I do not know how you will fare once I am gone.”

  “Where are you going?”

  “I am giving myself to you,” she whispered, lifting her hand up toward me, streams of light flooding through the tiny gaps in her fingers.

  The ribbons of light streamed over us, but this time the shadows on her face were not filled with the same beauty and hunger as they had been before. This time there was a sadness there, a pain that I could feel infecting me, seeping through me like a cold shower.

  The pain left as she opened her hand, flooding us with light and bringing back the feral need in a groan that ripped from my chest.

  “I am giving you all that I have, all that I am, so that you can find her. So that you can find yourself, so that you can return me to what I truly am. So that you can be what you truly are.” Her voice was so soft I had to strain to hear her, the emotion, the pain, growing as she stepped even closer, her hand almost touching my chest.

  “My magic…”

  “For your memories,” she interrupted me, with a paralyzed gasp, the pain rampaging through her and right into me.

  “How can I reach her if I don’t have my magic? I am not even sure if I am alive.” A different kind of fear racked through me, a genuine terror that I didn’t know how to compute.

  It was my magic that had kept me alive for years, that had continued to heal me as I was tortured. I didn’t know what awaited me outside of my dreams, outside of my memories. I didn’t know if I could survive it without that power.

  “You are alive,” she gasped, her free hand lifting toward me, her flat palm hovering inches from my shoulder, so close I swear I could feel her make contact. “You are safe. Your body is healed.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “You must find your mate, Ilyan,” I was well aware that she was not answering my question, but it didn’t matter. I trusted her.

  “She will reignite the power, she will bring your strength back when you find her. But you have to find her.”

  She inhaled loudly, the sound a shake as she stepped so close I could look nowhere but at her, at her eyes, at the way her lips curled.

  For a moment I forgot what the woman that stood before me was.

  “Can you do that?” She was pleading, her eyes wide and dark as hair blew around her.

  The look pulled a rock into my chest, the familiarity scarring me, even though
I knew it was not her, I wanted nothing more than to protect her. To protect Joclyn. To protect my magic.

  “I can.”

  “Find your mate, Ilyan,” she whispered, tears flowing down her cheeks. “She is waiting for you.”

  She looked at me one last time, the deep silver in her eyes glinting in a plea I was only starting to understand. I saw the desperation there for a second before she slammed her hand into my chest, pressing the bright light into the skin that spread over my heart.

  A pain as though I had been stabbed rippled over my skin, rattling my bones as an agony spread over me. I looked down in horror, expecting to see my chest covered in blood. Instead, each of the scars that crisscrossed over my chest was glowing with the same light that had beamed from her hand.

  “What…”

  “Find her, Ilyan.” Her words were like wind, the syllables swept away as the breeze that ran over her began to pick up, picking her up with it as if she was nothing more than dust.

  “Find her.”

  Only her words remained as the wind that had stayed locked from me suddenly turned into a torrent, my own hair whipping over my face, the threadbare pants I wore tugging and pulling over my skin.

  “I will find her.” I gasped, the words as breathy as the air that rattled around me.

  The force of the wind grew as I fell into the space around me, power and magic dragging me through nothing. I closed my eyes as the wind shifted, leaving me to fall through nothing once again.

  Nothing but black.

  “I will find her,” I said, my voice an odd gasp as the falling stopped, as the world changed, as a mattress cradled my body.

  And I opened my eyes to a vase of freshly cut flowers.

  18

  The flowers were fresh.

  I could smell the aroma from here, I could smell the sweetness of the pollen and that damp sugar-smell when you first cut a stem.

  From where I lay, I could see each fleck of pollen on the low hanging stamens. See the detail on the tiny drops of dew that covered the petals. I stared at the bright red petals as wide beams of light fell over them, the unfamiliar beauty streaming from the white-curtained windows to a cracked stone floor.

  The stone was similar to what I had used in the bathrooms in Rioseco, it had taken me months to find the perfect….

  My breath caught, my body tensing under the soft cotton blankets as a heart rate monitor somewhere in the room began to speed up.

  Rioseco. The Abbey I had built as a safe haven. The Abbey I had taken Joclyn to.

  I remembered.

  I remembered everything.

  The monitors sped even faster as I sat up, the blanket falling away to reveal a mess of wires and tubes and who knows what else attached to my skin and inserted into arms.

  I waved my hand, expecting them all to fall away with one surge of power. But nothing happened. Each tube remained plunged into arms, wires to chest.

  I growled, the memory of the imposter from my dream slamming hard against my chest as my heart did. Magic for my memories.

  At least, with the limited knowledge that I had, I had chosen my memories. I had chosen my Joclyn.

  “I’m coming, my love.” My voice was scratchy and coarse from ill-use, but the word, the phrase, the language, was so missed, so longed for, that it was followed by a sigh anyway.

  I was coming. And I knew right where to go.

  She would be in Imdalind, and if I had gotten out of the Ukraine I could be there in days.

  I moved to stand, my head spinning with the movement just as the door to my room opened. I turned at the sound, expecting to see Kaye walking in. Instead of the boisterous brunette, however, it was a young Asian man with oversized spectacles that only exaggerated the look of horror he had at seeing me sitting there.

  “What has happened?” The man stuttered in Mandarin, his eyes darting behind him as he began to back out of the room.

  “Where have I been taken?” I asked in the same language, the shock and fear on his face growing as he took another step, mouth opening to yell at someone behind him. “I mean you no harm, if you could hel…”

  “The monster is awake!” He screamed as he stepped back, slamming the door behind him and leaving me staring at the dark slab of wood.

  Yells and shouts filtered through the heavy wooden door, the word ‘monster’ repeated over and over.

  “Hovno,” I swore loudly, the word feeling awkward without the surge of power behind it.

  I didn’t have much time. The screams grew louder as my heart rate increased, the beeping ending as I began to rip off the sticky pads that covered my chest. Multiple monitors flatlined before my fingers wrapped around the tube that was inserted into my arm. The cold tubing pumped gently underneath my fingers, the pulse was as quick as my heart and it stopped me dead.

  Whatever it was had clearly been inserted directly into a vein. Judging by the size of the tube, if I just ripped it out I would have more problems than my blood splashed over flowers.

  I couldn’t heal.

  Although there was a shadow of magic deep inside of me, it wasn’t responding, I wasn’t even sure if it was magic. For all I knew, all mortals felt this way.

  And, that is exactly what I was.

  I stood, everything spinning again as I searched for a cloth or something to apply pressure so I could remove the tube. I was barely able to grip the nightstand beside the bed before I tumbled back down, the spinning overtaking me.

  Screw healing, I couldn’t even fight like this.

  It didn’t matter either way, head still spinning, tubing still pumping, the door was thrown open and a line of soldiers walked in, guns drawn.

  Scooting back against the headboard, the line of muzzles grew closer, the mumblings of what sounded like Russian, Mandarin, and even English buzzing from the hall.

  “I mean you no harm,” I said the words on repeat, moving through every language I was hearing and even adding a few others that were colloquially similar.

  The men and women behind the guns began to look at each other, their eyes wide with the same fear that the man who had walked in before had.

  It made sense as to why.

  Although I had no idea if any of these soldiers were of the ones who had shot me, the last thing they had been told was a story of me soaring through the air, firing infantile magic at people.

  I had thought I had been so powerful, so strong. The memory caused me to shake my head. If I had my memories, if I had control of even the tiny bit of magic I had retained I could have been out of here months after they had found me in the alley.

  “Where is Kaye,” I said clearly in Ukrainian, the switch from my language tour of before taking a few of the soldiers off guard.

  “I do not know what you mean.”

  I jerked at the clean voice, the deep English heavily accented with what was clearly Russian. Although the voice itself was not familiar, the tone, the words were filled with enough ice that my magic’s promise that I was safe seemed foolhardy.

  “Where is Kaye,” I repeated the words in English, eliminating as much of own accent as I could while keeping my voice strong.

  “Is this a person?” The same voice responded, even the soldiers that surrounded my bed were shifting in unease. “Is this the woman from the massacre in Prague fifteen years ago?”

  Fifteen years.

  It was lucky that I didn’t have my magic, I was sure to have exploded at that. Fifteen years since I had seen Joclyn. Fifteen years since I had thought her dead. Although the possibility of her being alive felt impossible, I had seen the images of her and Ry in Prague only seven years ago, I had watched the pulse of her heart as it connected to my magic moments before.

  She was alive.

  And I had spent more than a decade without her. The loss rose up in a painful pressure, the emotions far more painful without the possibility of expulsion.

  I focused on keeping my breathing even, on keeping my face impassive as I stared at the soldiers,
the row of unfamiliar uniforms still shielding whoever was talking.

  “We believe you are the man from that attack,” he continued on after a moment of silence, “is this true?”

  “I do not know what you are talking about.” My voice was much harder than it should have been, so, I shifted my weight, leaning toward the voice. “Kaye is my nurse.”

  The wall of blast guards and gun tips stared me down, the hidden faces of the soldiers looking at me with eyes so wide I began wondering if something else had changed in the last few years I had missed since our attempted escape.

  Two if my math was correct.

  It was not the soldiers that were concerning, however, it was the man who emerged from among them, his lanky frame leaning against the foot of my bed.

  The blonde man curled his hands around the metal railing as he leaned toward me, the military uniform diminishing his frame somehow. I had never met him before, but that hardly mattered, I knew the look, I knew the posturing voice.

  All of these men were the same.

  While normally I could deal with him the same way I would deal with my father. That was no longer an option.

  I would have to be tricky. At least I didn’t have handcuffs to deal with this time.

  “You are looking for your nurse?” He asked, the confusion growing at my request.

  “She was my friend.” I was successful in keeping the frustration out of my voice that time. “Where is she?”

  “Do you mean the woman you tried to escape from the SSU with? That leader of the villagers?”

  I remained quiet. Although answer or not, we both got what we wanted. He the affirmation of his knowledge of me, me the knowledge of where I was.

  “This is not the SSU.”

  His eyes sparked at my statement, lip twitching as his hands tightened against the railing.

  “We are part of the republic,” his tone made it clear he wasn't going to say anymore. He didn’t need to. I knew little of The Republic, just looking at the nationalities of those who surrounded me, however, I could piece it together.

  “And where is this republic?” As much as I tried to keep my tone conversational, he saw right through it-- that same light from before darkening into something treacherous. “Russia?”