Die and Stay Dead

by Nicholas Kaufmann

  The Guardians turned in unison to look at me. Shit. They’d heard my thoughts. I should have been more careful. They were all-knowing, weren’t they?

  One of the male Guardians addressed me, his long beard blowing in the breeze. “You are wise not to believe your eyes.”

  “What you see are merely illusions,” a female Guardian said. “Our forms, this landscape, they were chosen to put you at ease. But if we have misjudged and you are displeased, we can change it.”

  “That won’t be necessary,” Isaac said quickly, bowing again in deference. “Please don’t mind my friend here—”

  “No, hold on,” I said. “He gave up a year of his life to see you. That may not mean anything to you, but it does to us. The least you can do is stop with the bullshit and show him your real faces.”

  “Trent, don’t,” Isaac warned.

  The Guardians nodded in unison. One said, “Very well. If it is the truth you want, then you shall have it.”

  Instantly, the arctic landscape was gone. We were surrounded by a light so bright I had trouble keeping my eyes open against it. I raised a hand to shield my eyes, but it did no good. I had no sense of the space around me, or even which way was up. There was only the light and Isaac at my side, trying to shield his eyes just like I was. Was this the Radiant Lands in its true state? I sensed more than saw the Guardians nearby—seven titanic shapes encircling us, their features hidden by the light. The Guardians spoke then, but it wasn’t in any language I understood. It was a horrible sound. Every syllable was like nails scratching at a tomb door. I put my hands over my ears. It barely muffled the sound, but at least I was able to think. I’d heard this language before. I recognized it. It was the same language Bethany, Gabrielle, and Isaac used when they spoke their incantations. If Ehrlendarr was the language of the Ancients, then the eerie language of magic belonged to the Guardians.

  Suddenly we were back on the snow, beneath the clear blue sky. The seven Guardians sat in their chairs as before.

  “You will agree that perhaps this is better after all?” one of them asked.

  I blinked, letting my eyes adjust from the intense light. The terrible sounds still echoed in my ears. “Point taken.”

  Isaac scowled at me. “I told you to leave it alone.”

  “Do not scold him, Isaac Keene,” another Guardian said. “He is a good friend to you. His desire to defend you is admirable. Only a good friend would feel the price you paid is unjust. But know, both of you, that the price is necessary. There are those who would abuse the privilege of an audience with the Guardians. Only this way can we separate those who truly need us from those who seek power and personal gain.”

  “But even so, we have our own code,” another Guardian continued. “We observe but do not interfere. What makes you think we will help you find Erickson Arkwright?”

  “You know what he’s done,” Isaac said. “You know what he’s capable of.”

  “We know all,” a third Guardian said. “All is playing out as it is supposed to.”

  “Supposed to?” Isaac asked. “But surely you know what Arkwright is planning to do.”

  “We know all,” another repeated.

  “We do not interfere.”

  “We cannot give you what you ask, Isaac Keene.”

  Isaac looked crestfallen. “Guardians, I beseech you. You’re our last hope.”

  “You have our answer. All is playing out as it is supposed to.”

  That was all I could take. My fuse was already short. My anger had been simmering since we left Arkwright’s mansion. Now it boiled over.

  “The mighty Guardians,” I sneered. “What a joke. You know what I think? I think you’re a bunch of charlatans. You don’t tell people anything because you don’t know anything. You don’t do anything because you can’t. Well, congratulations, you’ve pulled the wool over everyone’s eyes. And for what? So you can steal years off desperate people’s lives to add to your own?”

  “Is that what you think?” a female Guardian asked.

  “Trent, stop it,” Isaac hissed at me. “They’ve made their decision. We’ll abide by it.”

  “It’s bullshit.” I stomped through the snow toward the Guardians. “If you’re not going to help, then give him back the year you took from him.”

  “Trent!” Isaac shouted after me.

  “You are wrong about us,” another Guardian said. “We do not steal life from others for ourselves. We are not like you.”

  That was a low blow.

  “Go on, then, prove me wrong and give it back to him,” I said, furious. “Give back both years you took, because twice now he’s come to you for help and twice now you’ve turned him away with nothing.”

  One of the female Guardians stood. She raised a hand. The snow under my feet broke apart. A thick, wooden vine sprouted from the ground and wrapped itself around my leg, stopping me. I tried to move my leg, but the vine held firm, refusing to snap no matter how hard I strained. I looked at the female Guardian again. If each Guardian ruled over an element, she had to be the Guardian of Wood.

  “Isaac Keene knew the risk when he paid the price,” she said. “Both times. He does not need you to fight his battles for him.”

  I looked back at Isaac. He glared at me and said, “I gave it willingly.”

  I turned back to the Guardians. “Fine, I get it, no refunds. Just tell me, what do you need a year from his life for? A year from anyone’s life? You’re immortal, aren’t you?”

  The vine unwound from my leg and retreated beneath the snow. The Guardian of Wood sat again.

  “It is not for us. We have no need of it,” she said. “The years are given to another. Someone who does.”

  “I thought it went against the laws of magic to take the life force from one person and give it to another,” I said.

  “Mortal magic, yes. Not ours.” The Guardian of Wood turned to Isaac. “I am sorry, Isaac Keene, but we cannot give you what you ask. We must remain neutral. For the balance.”

  “What balance?” I demanded. “In case you haven’t noticed, everything’s gone to shit. On your watch. What have you done to fix it?”

  “It is our existence that keeps the balance, not our actions.” She looked at the empty chair beside her. “Our brother’s absence is responsible for the current state of things, not us. But even if we could set things right in his place, we do not interfere. It is not our way.”

  “If you know everything like you say you do, then you know if Arkwright binds Nahash-Dred, it’s all over,” I said. “The world you’re supposed to protect will be destroyed.”

  “All is playing out as it is supposed to.”

  I groaned. I was starting to hate those words.

  “We do not interfere,” the Guardian of Wood said.

  “Well, maybe it’s time you fucking started,” I said.

  Isaac grabbed my arm and began pulling me away. “That’s it, Trent. We’re going.” He whispered angrily in my ear, “You do not lecture the Guardians.”

  “I think it’s high time someone did,” I said.

  “We don’t have time for this,” Isaac said. He spun me around and marched me back the way we came. A black, rectangular doorway stood on the snowdrift ahead of us, a hole in space leading back to the Library of Keys. Isaac let go of my arm and went through first. I was about to follow him when the Guardians spoke again.

  “Immortal Storm.”

  I stopped and turned around. The Guardians had moved. The chairs were gone, and now the seven of them stood in a semicircle right in front of me.

  “We see you,” one said.

  “We keep seeing you,” another said. “And you see us.”

  I nodded, remembering the times I’d glimpsed them. “I do, I see you whenever I…” I trailed off, not sure how to describe it. “When my vision changes.”

  “When you look through the skin of the world, you see us,” the Guardian of Wood said. “What does that tell you of our role? Of our power?”

  “Fi
ne,” I said. “I get it. You’re at the center of everything, you’re all-powerful. You just don’t give a damn.”

  The Guardian of Wood said, “But we keep seeing each other, Immortal Storm. There is a connection between us.” She cocked her head at me. “There is something … familiar about you.”

  The other Guardians chimed in.

  “So like our lost brother.”

  “Hotheaded. Stubborn. Impatient.”

  “There is a sense of him about you. You are endless, like him.”

  “You walk in eternity, like him.”

  “And yet, you are not him.”

  “No, you are not.”

  “You cannot be. The Guardian of Magic is gone from this world.”

  Great, so I wasn’t Lucas West and I wasn’t the Guardian of Magic. If I were using the process of elimination, that only left seven billion other possibilities. But maybe there was a faster way to find out.

  “You know who I am, don’t you?” I asked.

  They looked at me. None of them answered.

  “Right. I should have known better. We’re done here.” I pointed over my shoulder at the doorway in the snow. “Isaac is waiting for me on the other side. We don’t have a lot of time to stop the world from ending. No thanks to you.”

  One of the Guardians stepped forward, his long beard waving in the wind. “You speak prematurely. Are you so sure we will not give the information to you?”

  I squinted at him. “But you said…”

  “We told Isaac Keene we could not give it to him. We said nothing of you.” The Guardian opened one hand, palm up like he was holding something, but his hand was empty. “After the sky is torn open and the demon comes, when all that is to be said is said, and all that is to be done is done, the information you seek will be lost. It will be burnt and scattered to the winds. But that is the interesting thing about time. For most, it is a long, unceasing forward march. But for others, it flows in many different directions.”

  Tiny, partially burned pieces of parchment appeared on the wind, blowing toward the Guardian and gathering in his palm. They cycloned there, the small bits fusing together into larger ones, the scorch marks fading. Finally, he held a scroll in his hand, rolled up and bound with a black ribbon.

  “What is lost in the future still exists in the past,” the Guardian said. The Guardian of Time, I presumed.

  I reached for the scroll. He pulled it away from me.

  “Heed me. It does not matter where Erickson Arkwright is now. What matters is where he will be. On midnight of All Hallows’ Eve, when the wall between worlds is easiest to breach, he will open the doorway at the location written in this scroll, for this location is where the wall will be thinnest.”

  “I don’t understand,” I said. “Why would he open the doorway between dimensions if Nahash-Dred is already here?”

  The Guardian held up a hand to silence me. It was clear he had no intention of answering my question. “Know this, too. At this location, at the appointed time, Nahash-Dred will be revealed. Are you prepared for that, Immortal Storm? You must be prepared.”

  “I am,” I said.

  “Are you truly? I wonder,” the Guardian of Time said.

  He handed the scroll to me. I quickly undid the ribbon and opened it. Written on the parchment was a blocky, ancient-looking alphabet I couldn’t read. Maybe Isaac could. I closed it again and looked up at the Guardian of Time.

  “Why are you helping us?” I asked. “I thought you didn’t get involved.”

  He smiled. “All is playing out—”

  “As it is supposed to,” I finished. “Right. You guys sound like a broken record. But thank you for this. You might have just saved everyone’s life.”

  “Not everyone’s,” the Guardian of Time said. “Lives will be lost, and the infection will claim another. Someone close to you.”

  “The infection?” I thought of the darkness I’d seen growing inside Gabrielle. Was that what the Guardian meant? Was there no way to stop it before it claimed her?

  “Listen to me, Immortal Storm,” the Guardian of Time said. “Be sure you are ready. You cannot control what dwells inside you. It will control you first. It has already begun.”

  The Guardian of Wood nodded, her long, white hair trailing in the breeze. “The Immortal Storm is the force that will destroy us all. So it is prophesied.”

  “Unless,” said another Guardian.

  “Unless,” added another.

  “Unless you die.”

  “Die a true death.”

  “I don’t believe in prophecies,” I told them.

  “Belief has nothing to do with it. Not believing in snow will not stop a blizzard,” the Guardian of Time said. “Find a way to die, Immortal Storm. Before the prophecy comes true.”

  Thirty-Four

  Isaac drove us back to Citadel. The rain had finally stopped. The wet blacktop glistened under the Escalade’s wheels.

  “I can’t believe the Guardians gave you the information,” he said, shaking his head in disbelief. “How did you convince them to help?”

  “Must be my natural charm,” I said.

  I was still trying to process what the Guardians had told me. The Immortal Storm is the force that will destroy us all. It hit a nerve, reminding me too much of what the oracles had said. For a while, I’d thought I was free of the curse of the Immortal Storm when I was Lucas West. But that had been a lie. I wasn’t free at all. I was starting to think I never would be.

  “Charm? After the way you spoke to them, you’re lucky the Guardians didn’t turn you into a frog,” Isaac said.

  “Can they do that?”

  “I think they can do pretty much anything,” he said. “That’s why it stings so much when they refuse to get involved.”

  But they’d gotten involved this time. Why? They refused to say, other than that everything was playing out the way it was supposed to, whatever that meant. I unrolled the scroll again, looking over the strange, blocky letters. At first I’d thought they’d been written in ink. Now I saw they’d been expertly burned into the parchment, without burning through it. It was amazing workmanship. Impossible workmanship.

  “You’re sure you can translate this?” I said.

  “I think so,” he said. “If I’m right, it’s a very old language, one that hasn’t been seen in a long time. But there are texts I can consult. I just need time.”

  “What language is it?” I asked.

  “I think it’s Elvish,” he said.

  “I thought there weren’t any elves left. Didn’t they all take off for greener pastures after World War Two?”

  “They did,” he said. “But look at the scroll again. It doesn’t look particularly new to me. It could have been written centuries ago.”

  “Why would elves write a scroll centuries ago with the information we need now, in 2013?” I asked.

  Isaac shrugged. “Where the Guardians are concerned, I’ve found it’s best not to ask too many questions.”

  * * *

  When we reached Citadel, Gabrielle met us at the door. I grilled her for an update on Bethany.

  “She’s resting comfortably,” Gabrielle said. “I put her in your room. I hope that’s okay. I didn’t know where else to put her.”

  “It’s fine,” I said.

  “I’ve been treating her burns with Sanare moss,” Gabrielle continued. “She’s stable now. She’ll pull through, but she’ll almost certainly have a scar.”

  I sighed with relief. Bethany was going to be okay. The three of us climbed the stairs to the second floor. Isaac took the scroll with him to his study. He paused at the door.

  “I’m not to be interrupted,” he said. “Not for any reason. I need to concentrate if I’m going to translate this.”

  “Is there anything we can do?” Gabrielle asked.

  He shook his head. “I just need time.” He shut himself in his study.

  I looked down the hall at the door to my room. “Can I see her?”

&nbs
p; Gabrielle nodded. “She asked me to send you in when you got back. Just be sure to let her rest, okay? She’s going to need another treatment soon. Come get me when you’re ready and I’ll take care of it.”

  I nodded. “Thanks.”

  Gabrielle went back downstairs. I started at the door to my room for a moment. The last time I’d been here with Bethany, we’d gotten into an argument about Jordana. I felt like a fool for not listening to her. I knocked softly, opened the door, and went in. The room was dark. The shades had been drawn over the window. After I gently shut the door behind me, the only light was the dim gray of the approaching dawn seeping in around the shades. Bethany was sleeping on the bed, facing away from me. Kali was curled up on the covers by Bethany’s legs, purring and dozing. It was obvious the cat liked Bethany more than she liked me. She’d made the right choice.

  I sat down in the chair across the room and put my head in my hands. This was my fault. I was the reason Bethany was hurt. Gabrielle said she’d be all right, but what if the wound had been worse? What if the Thracian Gauntlet’s blast had hit her full on? I’d almost gotten Bethany killed. My blindness—my stubbornness—had almost killed my closest friend.

  In the darkness of the room, I heard Bethany speak. “You asked me once if I remembered my family. I don’t.”

  “I didn’t realize you were awake,” I said, sitting up.

  “My parents gave me up when I was very young, too young to remember them,” she said. “But that doesn’t mean I don’t think about them. I do, all the time.”

  She turned to face me. She grimaced a little as she did, as though it hurt to move. More guilt surged within me. Upset at having lost her dozing spot, Kali jumped off the bed and scurried into the darkness beneath it.

  “I’m going to tell you something I’ve never told anyone,” Bethany said. “When I was young, I would think about my parents for hours on end, but I didn’t know how to picture them. When I thought of my mother, I imagined the illustration of a queen I saw in a storybook once. She didn’t look anything like me. She was tall and blond. But she was also beautiful and strong, just the way I hoped my mother was. When I thought of my father, I pictured … God, I can’t believe I’m telling you this.”