by K. A. Linde
“Can someone fill us in?” Cyrene asked.
Avoca took a deep breath and nodded. Then, she pulled back a branch that had obscured the valley. Below them was a giant pile of rubble and the blackened and charred tree that still stood as tall as the eye could see.
“Whoa!” Cal said. “What is this place?”
“Aonia,” Avoca said. “The home of my northern kin.”
“Your northern kin must not be doing that well,” Cal said with a frown.
“They were slaughtered like animals,” Avoca said.
“This is what happened to Ceis’f’s people?” Cyrene asked.
Avoca nodded grimly. “Twenty years ago, Ceis’f was on a diplomatic mission for his people, and he came back to this. He wouldn’t speak of it. Not even to me. He was the only survivor.”
Cyrene hadn’t thought about Ceis’f since he abandoned them in Eleysia. He had been so determined to take Avoca home to Eldora, marry her, and make her queen. He hadn’t seen that she was falling for Ahlvie. Things had gone south quickly.
“No wonder he hates humans,” Ahlvie said.
It was a rare day when Ahlvie could defend Ceis’f, but looking out across the ruins, Cyrene could see why. His people hadn’t just been slaughtered; his home had been destroyed, burned, and desecrated. What had once surely been a beautiful home was now a wasteland.
“And, now…wraiths are living here?” Cyrene asked.
“It appears that way.” Avoca turned her head away from the view. “The trail leads straight into Aonia.”
“Well, at least we have the whereabouts now,” Cyrene said. She touched Avoca’s arm. “We can head back, mount a larger party, and then come back to clear this all out.”
“I hate to be insensitive,” Dean said, “but we just hiked leagues through those woods. What if these wraiths can sense your magic as easily as you can sense theirs? Then, the wraiths will move camp, and we will have lost the trail.”
“If Avoca isn’t ready to go in there, I will not force her,” Cyrene said, glaring at Dean for the suggestion even though she knew it was valid.
“He has a point,” Cal chimed in. “I mean, we’ve been tracking these things for months, but we never sent out an ancient one. We might never have this opportunity again.”
“Ahlvie?” Cyrene pleaded.
“It’s up to Avoca,” Ahlvie said.
“I’m fine,” Avoca said, shaking off Cyrene’s concern. “Let’s slaughter these beasts and be gone from here. It makes my skin crawl.”
Then, she burst from the tree line and out toward the ruins of Aonia.
Cyrene had to agree. The closer they got to the lost Leif city, the more disturbed she became. Whatever had happened here was not any ordinary attack. Humans alone could not have done something this horrible…something this wrong.
Cal slung her bow over her shoulder and shivered. “This place gives me the creeps.”
“The creeps?” Cyrene asked with a half-smile.
“Yeah.” Then, Cal ran her hands up and down her arms and shook from head to toe. “The creeps.”
“Yes. There is something not right about this place.”
“Don’t wander off,” Avoca snapped at Dean as he began to open up crumbling doors to peer into caved-in rooms and empty buildings.
Their ragtag group formed up and followed Avoca deeper into the crumbling city.
Cal’s eyes were wide with wonder. “How did I never know about this place?” she asked.
Ahlvie nudged her shoulder. “This place is forbidden.”
“As it should be,” Avoca snapped.
“But it’s not that far away. I should have at least heard about it.”
“Most kids aren’t told about it until after they pass their lone wolf test,” Ahlvie told her.
“I’m not a kid!”
“Not you, of course. Your mother would have my head if she knew I’d brought you out here.”
“Have you been before?”
Ahlvie sharply glanced at Avoca and then nodded. “Once. A group of us came out here the night before I was to leave for my Presenting in Byern. Trekked through the snow and got rip-roaring drunk.”
Cal laughed, and it sounded so out of place.
“Not much of a story,” Cyrene said. “Don’t you get drunk everywhere?”
“Quiet!” Avoca snapped. “Have some respect for the dead.”
After that, all conversation ceased. It wasn’t easy to forget that they were on the site of hundreds of dead Leifs. The feeling emanated from the very stones they walked on and leeched into the dead grass and poisoned what little what remained.
Avoca stopped before what appeared to have once been an enormous building. Possibly a castle of some sort in its former glory. Inside was the blackened tree.
“The trail is gone,” Avoca said. “Or it’s everywhere. The wraiths have definitely been here. All over the city if I had to guess. They seem to have taken over the ruins themselves. I can feel it in the stones and the very air. I can’t even take in air magic here. It feels…tainted.”
“Well, we can’t search every building here,” Ahlvie said. “The city is sprawling. We’d have to split up.”
“No,” Avoca said at once.
“Which I don’t think we should do,” Ahlvie added.
Avoca shook her head. “Let’s search the site of the sacred tree and then head back. If they’re not here any longer, then we’ve lost them.”
Avoca pushed open the door to a crumbling ballroom.
“Why is the tree sacred?” Cal asked as they entered.
“Because, thousands of years ago, it was brought over from my ancestors’ world to symbolize the magic and life force of our people. When they discovered this land, they picked three sites to build new homes for their children and their children’s children. One took a sapling to the Hidden Forest, where my kin still live in Eldora; another took one to Isola in Kell, where civil war destroyed their people long before I was born; and one was brought here to Aonia. As you can see, whoever destroyed this city, they did a thorough job.”
“A little too thorough,” Cal muttered under her breath.
They meandered across the ballroom, up a half-dozen stairs, and into a round chamber with many doors. At the center was the sacred tree. No matter that it had been burned and blackened, even in death, it was still magnificent.
“Someone has definitely been here,” Dean observed.
Ahlvie frowned. “Yes. There isn’t a hint of rubble here.”
Cal dropped her hand to the ground and drew a finger across a marble stone. “Has someone swept? Have the wraiths been taking care of the sacred tree?”
Avoca moved her eyes around the room. “It doesn’t make any sense. What kind of creatures would try to steal people from your village but take care of the sacred tree?”
“You know,” Ahlvie said, “now that I think about it, the last time I was here, this room was walled off. We tried to get to the tree, and there was no way inside. Not even by climbing to the roof. We tried.”
Avoca shot him a dirty look.
He held his hands up, as if to say, What? I was a stupid kid!
“Well, whoever has been here even cleaned this mirror,” Dean called from the other side of the room. “It almost looks like a window.”
“No!” Avoca cried, startling everyone. “Don’t look in it.”
Dean jumped back, as if she had hit him. “Why not?”
“Creator! You almost looked into the Mirror of Truth.”
“The what of what?” Cal asked as she rushed to the other side of the room.
“Surely, someone would have shattered a mirror in here,” Ahlvie said. “Like the people who did this?”
“It’s unbreakable. I would have thought it had been moved, but perhaps it wasn’t possible.” Avoca trailed her hand down the intricate carvings on the side of the floor-length mirror. “See here? It looks like someone tried to pry it off the wall. Whatever spell keeps it here might keep it here until
the end of time.”
“What does it do?” Cyrene asked.
Avoca shook her head. “It shows you the truth. Not the truth you want to see, but the truth you need to see. Past, present, and future. In Emporia, it’s told that those who look into the Mirror to see the future are never the same. I was told that a Leif foresaw the breaking of magic back before the Battle of the Light and promptly went mad.”
“It’s just a mirror,” Cal said. “How could it make you go mad?”
Avoca put her arm on Cal’s shoulder and turned her away from the mirror. “Let’s never find out, okay?”
“I have a few truths I’d like to know,” Ahlvie muttered.
“Not this way.”
“If Avoca says it can harm you, Ahlvie, then we’d better not,” Cyrene said. “Come on. This isn’t why we’re here anyway.”
Cyrene was halfway around the dead tree before realizing that not everyone was with them. Her head swung back toward the mirror, and she gasped. “Dean, no!”
But it was too late.
Dean had fully faced the Mirror of Truth and was gazing headlong into its depths.
“Avoca!” Cyrene called before sprinting after Dean.
Cyrene grabbed his arm and tried to bodily pull him away from in front of the mirror. But he was locked on, as if whatever powerful magic was in that mirror held him on a leash.
“Please, please!” she cried. “What truth do you need so desperately?”
Dean’s eyes were as big as saucers, and his pupils blasted out. “No,” he gasped. “No, please! No!”
Tears streamed down his face, and Cyrene was helpless, standing there, watching him uncover whatever he’d had to know. Avoca reached for her, but she pushed her away.
“This is his burden to bear, Cyrene,” Avoca said.
“You said he could go mad!” Cyrene cried.
“He can. He knew the risk and did it anyway. It is usually that way for those who are desperate to know.”
“And he is,” Ahlvie whispered.
“What? Why?”
“They’re dead,” Dean moaned. “All dead. All of them.”
“Who?” Cyrene asked.
“We didn’t know how to tell you,” Avoca said gently. “While you were unconscious, Byern led an attack against Eleysia. All reports suggest that the capital city was burned to the ground.”
Cyrene’s hand flew to her mouth. “No! How could they do that? Eleysia has the best navy in the world.”
Ahlvie shook his head. “No one knows. Not much reaches Fen, but if it’s big enough, it does. This…was.”
“What does that matter?” Cal asked in confusion.
“He’s from there,” Avoca told her.
Cyrene shook her head and turned back to Dean. No matter their differences or what had transpired between them, she had never wanted him to suffer something like this.
It had been bad enough when Cyrene endured Maelia’s death. Then, Daufina. Then, her parents. Her heart had broken and hardened with each new blow.
But to lose everyone you know and love. Your home. Your whole world. She couldn’t imagine what that must be like.
“I’ll do it,” Dean said. “I will.”
Then, he collapsed in a heap on the floor.
Cyrene threw herself on top of him. “Dean! Dean, wake up.” She slapped him across the face. “You do not get to go stark raving mad. You do not get to leave this world. I am still too mad at you to allow you to do that! Get up! Get up now!”
“Cyrene,” Avoca said, pulling her back.
“No! No, I have lost too much. He cannot be gone, too. He’s a fool, but he stayed. He knew his family was dead, and he could have gone to his home to pick up the pieces. But he stayed, Avoca,” Cyrene said, tears now falling from her own eyes. “He stayed for me. So, you’d better help me bring him back! Or so help me Creator!”
Avoca frowned. “There isn’t a cure, Cyrene.”
“There wasn’t a cure for me either!”
“Um…guys,” Cal said, turning back to face the front of the room and drawing her bow and arrow.
Everyone’s eyes shot to the same place. Ahlvie pulled his sword from its sheath. Avoca suddenly had her ice-white blade in her hand. Cyrene reached for her magic, ready to face the wraith.
Only, when the creature stepped forward into the light, Cyrene gasped. Avoca’s blade clattered to the ground. Ahlvie took a step forward to block Avoca.
It was only Cal who was ready. She let her arrow fly. It soared through the air, true to its mark. But, at the last second, with a flick of his wrist, the arrow flew harmlessly wide.
“What the…” Cal asked.
And then he stepped fully into view.
“Hello, Ava,” Ceis’f said.
“Well, this is a surprise,” Ahlvie muttered.
“You come to my city and are surprised to find me in it?” Ceis’f asked. His golden eyes roamed over the faces of their party before landing hungrily on Avoca’s face.
“We had no idea where you went,” Cyrene said when Avoca remained silent.
“Perhaps I didn’t want to be found.”
Everyone shifted on their feet, except Cal, whose eyes were darting between Ceis’f and Cyrene. “What’s going on?”
Avoca breathed softly. “Just an old friend we weren’t expecting to see.”
Cyrene sighed. “Look, we’re not here for any trouble.”
Her eyes darted to Dean, who was still lying unconscious on the floor. She had not anticipated a reunion with Ceis’f in this plan. She’d thought it would be easy. A get-in, get-out kind of job. But, of course, nothing was ever easy in her life.
“Humans never are,” Ceis’f spat. “Somehow, they always seem to cause it.”
“Did you clear out the temple?” Avoca asked.
Ceis’f nodded. “Seemed like the right thing to do since I have nowhere else to go.”
Avoca’s hands flexed and tightened at her sides. “You know you are always welcome in Eldora.”
“Don’t,” Ceis’f ground out. “That is not home, and with you gone, it is nothing at all.”
“I understand,” Avoca said.
Ceis’f grumbled something under his breath. “What are you all doing here anyway?”
“We’ve been staying at a local village, and it has been attacked the last couple of months by wraiths,” Avoca said. “Cal here is from the village, and she was helping us track them. It led us here. You wouldn’t happen to know anything about that, would you?”
“Wraiths?” he asked with a disgruntled snort. “Try a Nokkin, Ava.”
Avoca stumbled forward. Ahlvie reached for her to steady her.
Cyrene sighed. “What is a Nokkin?”
“That’s what I want to know,” Cal said.
“A creature of legend,” Ceis’f told them.
“They were once Doma, one of the first families in ancient times. They were extremely powerful and obsessed with dark magic. They were so determined to gain power that the power they gathered took over their bodies. It stripped their souls and made them something else. Something more sinister. They’re humanlike, but they can become a shadow at will. They feed off magic and suck the life from people until there’s nothing left of them, or so the stories go.”
Cyrene swayed on her feet. Suck magic from bodies. Turn into shadow. Reek of dark magic.
Creator! She had faced one before. Perhaps the same Nokkin that had been terrorizing Fen. Perhaps it had come here because of her. She hadn’t remembered that encounter in the mountains until now. She had thought that she had killed that thing by blasting it with her magic, but maybe she was wrong.
“But they’re all dead,” Avoca said. “Mother said they were all killed in the war.”
Ceis’f shrugged as he circled around the tree. “Guess she was wrong.”
“How do you kill them?” Ahlvie asked practically.
“If I knew, don’t you think I would have done it by now?” Ceis’f spat. “I’ve been trying to ge
t rid of the damn thing since I got here. So, good luck with that.”
“We’ll need to consult with Matilde and Vera,” Avoca said, picking up her blade and concealing it once more. “They might be the only people still alive who have faced a Nokkin, and they will have some insight into how to defeat it.”
“Can we speak alone for a moment?” Ceis’f asked, reaching out for Avoca’s elbow.
Ahlvie crossed his arms and glared back at Ceis’f. Cyrene hoped the trio didn’t ignite and burn the whole place down a second time.
“I’ll handle this,” Avoca told Ahlvie before disappearing with Ceis’f.
“Well, he’s a real treat,” Cal muttered when he was gone.
“You can say that again,” Ahlvie grumbled. “I’m going to go spy on them.”
“Can I come, too?” Cal asked excitedly.
Cyrene was about to tell them both off when she heard a loud groan behind her. “Dean?”
She fell to his side and tried to help him sit up as he seemed to come to. Cal abandoned Ahlvie’s pursuit of Avoca to help Cyrene lift him.
“Is he going to be okay?” she asked.
Cyrene bit her lip. “I don’t know. I don’t know enough about that mirror to be sure.”
Dean groaned again and then leaned forward, pushing his hands into his head. “Ugh!”
“Dean, are you okay? Can you hear what I am saying? Can you see me? Do you remember who I am?”
She pushed her face right before his, and he cracked open an eye.
“Cyrene?” he muttered. “You look beautiful.”
“I look like I trekked hours through the forest and need a good meal and hot bath.”
“Just like the day I met you,” he said, winding a lock of her hair around his finger.
She abruptly pulled back. She hadn’t meant to make that so personal. She had been worried that she would lose someone else. Not that she entirely forgave Dean for what had happened, but she could tell he had been trying to prove himself to her.
“Well, at least you remember that much,” she said. “Do you remember anything you saw in the Mirror?”
He frowned, and his pupils dilated. “Pieces. Bits and pieces. Things that I didn’t want to see. And…a path. A way to earn it.”