Emerald Darkness

by Cannon, Sarra

  Chills ran through my body. I looked away, toward the fire, scared to meet his gaze. My heart raced, and I couldn’t catch my breath.

  Aerden moved to crouch in front of the fire and took my hands in his.

  “Lea, there’s something I need to tell you about the day I left,” he said.

  I looked up. It was suddenly as if the world was spinning, and I couldn’t get control. What was happening between us? I wasn’t sure I wanted this. Over these past few months of training together, we’d somehow naturally gravitated toward each other, always seeking each other out. But I’d thought it was only because we both felt so much pain.

  Now, I wasn’t so sure.

  Panic washed over me like a mountainous wave, threatening to pull me under. I had worked so hard to get control of my pain. I couldn’t handle opening myself up to something more.

  But as he opened his mouth to speak, something passed close to us. A shadow in the night, its energy filling the air around us.

  I snapped my head to the left, recognizing the scent of that magic.

  The hunter we’d been searching for was close.

  I pulled my hands from his and quickly threw my blanket over the fire, extinguishing the flames. I held a finger over my lips and pushed him down to the ground at my side.

  If she found us here, we’d have to fight. Any chance we had of following her or learning who she’d been working for would be lost.

  Aerden’s body pressed close to mine on the ground, and we waited, listening for any sound of the hunter as she passed by.

  Into Darkness

  I paced the floor of the bedroom, stepping out into the hallway every few minutes just to make sure Harper wasn’t back.

  Yes, we needed someone here to keep an eye on the communication stones and to guard the house, but I hated the thought of them alone in that house. As far as we knew, Winterhaven had been deserted since Priestess Winter died. Her two oldest daughters, Honora and Selene, were locked in the dungeons in Harper’s castle, and Zara, her youngest, was living here with us.

  No one else should have had access to that house, but we had no idea what Priestess Winter’s sisters could and couldn’t do. It was possible they had been using Winterhaven for themselves all these months without us knowing. Zara had only been back a few times to get some of her clothes and things.

  We had no idea who might be living there or using that house now.

  I prayed they were safe.

  They’d been gone at least an hour now, but it felt more like days to me. With the world locked in darkness, time was passing in a strange way, anyway, like an endless night where you couldn’t sleep and every tick of the clock was torturous. Except no clocks were ticking tonight. Everything was silent.

  Courtney was still in the guest room with Sophie, but she said she wasn’t having much luck restoring the girl’s power. I had tried to heal her wounds, but nothing I could do would take away the strange scratches on her skin. It was almost like they had been permanently put there.

  I felt helpless.

  I didn’t know where my brother and Lea were or if they were having any luck in the Shadow World. So much of my group was out doing what they could to help, and I was stuck here in Brighton Manor, pacing the floors.

  Footsteps in the hallway made my blood pump faster. I rushed around the corner, but no one was there.

  I knocked on Courtney’s door to see if she had gone into her own room to rest, but there was no answer. I went to the guest room next and opened the door slowly, not wanting to disturb them.

  The bed was empty and at first, I thought maybe both of them had gone downstairs or something.

  But then I saw a pale hand stretching out across the hardwoods on the other side of the bed. I ran around to find Courtney struggling for breath, trying to claw her way across the floor. I lifted her into my arms.

  I placed my hand on her chest, sending my magic through her body to try to find whatever was choking her, but there was nothing physically wrong with her. She had been struck down by an evil spell, its darkness pushing back at me.

  “No,” I shouted. “Come on, Courtney, hang in there.”

  My eyes watered, and I looked toward the door, searching for Sophie. Had she been taken, too? Had whoever attacked the emerald gates come back for her?

  I didn’t see any sign of the girl, so I focused all of my energy on Courtney. Her eyes were wide and frightened and she reached up to grab my shirt, holding on, desperate for air.

  I placed both of my hands on her chest, closing my eyes to picture her lungs. I imagined them filling with air, breathing in and out to give her life. I sent a wave of healing magic through her body, but again the darkness pushed back, locking me out.

  Frantic, I reached in my pocket and found Angela’s communication stone. I waved my hand over it and as soon as I heard her voice, I told her to come.

  “What’s happened?” she asked. “Is Harper okay?”

  “It’s Courtney,” I said. “She can’t breathe. I don’t know what else to do. I need you. Hurry.”

  “I’m already on my way,” she said.

  I dropped the stone and lay Courtney down on the floor, preparing to give CPR. If magic wouldn’t work, maybe I could force air into her lungs the old-fashioned way.

  I tilted her head back and placed my mouth over hers, pushing my breath into her body, but the air would not pass through. I couldn’t feel any kind of physical blockage, but whatever dark magic had been cast on her, it wouldn’t allow any air into her body.

  I leaned down, my face close to hers, trying to feel any tiny breath, but there was nothing. Her body began to seize against the floor and I put my hands on her again, trying harder to release the spell.

  Angela wasn’t going to make it in time.

  I closed my eyes and pressed my fists against my forehead. Think, Jackson, think. What else could I do? I couldn’t let her die right here in front of me.

  My eyes snapped open. I could only think of one thing to do. I raised my palms and focused all of my energy on the freezing cold ice that gathered there. I placed my hands on her body one more time and blew out, allowing my freezing breath to coat her with a pale blue ice. If I could get her core body temperature down, I could potentially put her in a state of suspended life.

  That would at least give Angela time to get here.

  I continued until there was at least two inches of ice completely around her body. Her eyes were closed inside the icy cocoon, and I prayed she was still alive.

  I stood and went to look for Sophie, thinking whoever had done this to Courtney must have taken her.

  But as I stepped into the hallway, I understood too late what had happened.

  I felt the hope drain from my body as a blast of energy rushed toward me. I fell to my knees, unable to lift my hands or shift in time to protect myself.

  As my head hit the floor, flames erupted around me. The house was on fire.

  I struggled to stand and fight, but iron chains locked around my wrists and everything around me faded into darkness.

  They Needed Me

  Zara and I headed back down the hallway toward Brighton Manor. I tried to wrap my head around all that was happening to us.

  I wasn’t sure how much more I could take.

  All this time, I’d been afraid of what might happen once the remaining priestesses decided to get their revenge, but the reality was so much worse than anything I’d imagined.

  The emerald priestess was always one step ahead of me, her plan already carefully formed. I was just a player in her game at this point. She moved me around on the chessboard, and I had yet to gain any real control.

  And who was the woman in the dark cloak? What role did she play?

  I’d believed she was trying to help us, but after seeing a vision of her there at Winterhaven, I didn’t know what to think or how to make sense of it.

  If she wanted to help, why didn’t she just come to me? Why bother with dreams and visions?

&n
bsp; I was so tired of having a million questions and no good answers.

  The attack on the Southern Kingdom. Zara and her bloodline turning to hunters. The disappearance of my friends and allies at the emerald gates. The darkness, locked at specifically three a.m., the time most powerful for the Order, but us somehow saved from being locked inside the spell because we were not here.

  It all fit together somehow, but I just couldn’t see it.

  I would never be able to forgive myself if Eloise and the other witches died. Yes, they knew what they were getting themselves into when they joined us, but they trusted me. They believed I was strong enough to keep them safe and to bring the Order to their knees.

  I didn’t want to let them down. How many had already been sacrificed to keep the priestess’s spell going?

  We reached the door to Brighton Manor, but when I placed my hand on the knob, it refused to open.

  Confused, I tried again, turning the silver knob and pushing with all my strength.

  But it was stuck.

  “What’s wrong?” Zara asked. She leaned against the wall, steadying herself.

  “It won’t open.”

  I took a deep breath, trying to calm the panic that threatened to take hold. Everything was fine. It was probably just rusty from not being used for so long.

  But when I placed my hand on the knob again, the silver burned me. I cried out and pulled my hand away, shaking it to relieve the burning.

  Something was wrong.

  I reared back and kicked at the door. The wood was heavy and not easy to break through, but all I could think about was Jackson. He was home with Courtney and Sophie. If someone had attacked, they were in trouble and they needed me.

  I kicked again, but the door wouldn’t budge.

  I backed away, taking a deep breath. I focused all my anger and rage and worry, taking it into my lungs as I spread my palms out at my side.

  I reached back and with one great push forward, blew the door from its hinges.

  Emerald flames consumed the door as it fell into the pentagram-shaped room in my attic. I grabbed Zara, lifting her into my arms. I shifted to white smoke and shadow and flew through the fiery wall, down the stairs to the main house, not caring about being burned. All I cared about was getting Zara to safety and finding Jackson and making sure he and the girls were alive.

  I set her on the front porch and told her to run.

  “Jackson,” I shouted as I reformed and flew back up the stairs. I searched the rooms, but I couldn’t find him through the smoke and fire that consumed my house. I ran to the guest room and screamed.

  Courtney lay on the floor, her body encased in a thick sheet of rapidly melting blue ice. I tried to pick her up, but she was too heavy.

  I used my mind, instead, pushing past the fatigue to lift her up.

  I smashed the window with my elbow, coughing from the dark green smoke that filled the room. Flames burned my feet and my legs, but I kept my mind focused, knowing that if I concentrated on the pain, we would both be dead in minutes.

  With all that I had left, I floated Courtney through the window toward the garden behind the house. I set her down near the stone fountain, and then, as the fire took hold of the entire room, shifted to smoke and flew down after her.

  I knelt at her side, looking up as the only place I’d ever truly called home burned to the ground.

  Against The Darkness

  The hunter made her way up a narrow path between the rocks.

  Aerden and I shifted, using our powers for the first time so that we wouldn’t be seen. Right now, following the hunter was the only thing that mattered. We would do what we could to cover our tracks and get far away from any sign of our magic later.

  We stayed a safe distance behind her, careful not to lose her in the dark. She was using a lantern to guide her way, its light a pure amber glow against the darkness.

  That magic was what I had sensed. If she had not been casting this light, she might have passed right by us unseen.

  I couldn’t believe our luck.

  For almost two hours, we followed her up the mountain’s twisting path. Finally, she stopped outside the mouth of a large cave carved into the rock on the western side. She looked around and then went inside.

  Aerden and I waited a few minutes before we followed her, just in case she was watching the cave’s entrance. We stuck to our demon forms, slinking through the shadows behind her.

  The cave was deep, going at least half a mile into the heart of the mountain. There were several paths to take, but luckily the hunter was still using her magical light. We followed her easily, stopping when we finally saw her place the lantern on the floor and take a stone from her pocket.

  We shifted back to solid form and hid behind a craggy stone that jutted out from the side of the rock.

  The hunter moved her arms in a circular motion in front of her body, her robes waving like a flag. Slowly, a portal began to open over the stone she’d placed on the floor, a black hole of a thing that swirled and moved. I squinted, but couldn’t make out anything on the other side of that portal. All I could see was black air, dense like a cloud.

  A voice came from the void.

  “You survived,” the voice said.

  “Yes, Priestess,” the hunter answered. “The attack was a success, but we were too late. The two Winter girls in the dungeons had already changed. But there is another. The youngest, Zara. There’s still time.”

  “How dare you call your attack a success. This whole thing should have been over by now,” the priestess said. “If you had not attacked the domed city early, Harper and Zara both would have been frozen in time with the rest of the world. You almost ruined everything.”

  The hunter dipped her head. “I’m sorry, My Priestess,” she said. “We attacked when you told us to begin. I don’t understand.”

  “I never gave the order to attack,” the priestess said. “You fools. I had everything planned to perfection. Every minor detail accounted for. You attacked two hours early.”

  The hunter shook her head violently. “No. We heard your voice,” she said. “We heard you urging us from the shadows. We did as we were told.”

  “Never mind it now. It can’t be changed,” the priestess said. “I’ve had to improvise, but I can keep the world locked in time for days if I have to. I’ve sent my beloved daughter into the enemy’s camp. She’ll take care of them for me. She’s attacking Brighton Manor as we speak. As soon as she captures the demon, Harper will do everything it takes to get him back. She’ll walk right into our trap and never see it coming.”

  Aerden’s hand gripped my arm. My body pulsed with fear. Brighton Manor was being attacked and she was going to capture Jackson. This whole thing had been some kind of trap.

  Had we made a huge mistake leaving them there?

  It took everything I had not to betray our position and run for the cave’s entrance. But right now, the only advantage we had was that the hunter and her priestess didn’t know we’d overheard their conversation. They didn’t know we knew about the trap.

  If we could just make it back to Harper and the others, maybe we could still help them defeat her.

  Quietly, Aerden and I shifted and made our way back to the cave’s entrance. By the time we emerged from the cave, I could hardly breathe. Sweat covered my body, and all I wanted to do was shift and fly back to the portal in the Southern Kingdom as fast as possible.

  I opened my mouth to speak, but Aerden placed a fingertip on my lips to hush me. He pointed back toward the cave and I nodded, my body electric with impatience.

  We shifted and flew down the mountain, not bothering with the path and taking a more direct route, skimming the surface of the stones.

  We took solid form at the bottom of the mountain, and I doubled over, feeling ill.

  “They’ll have warning, right? There are barriers over the estate,” I said. “Maybe we can still get there in time.”

  Aerden shook his head and ran a hand thr
ough his long, dark hair.

  “The witch said the attack had already started,” he said. “They’re going to take Jackson, and use that to draw Harper into some kind of trap.”

  “We have to get back there to warn her,” I said. “We have to help rescue him.”

  I thought I was ready to move on from my life with the Demon Liberation Movement, but knowing what they were going through proved that I still cared about them all too much to turn my back on them.

  I desperately wanted to let go of the pain Jackson had caused me, but no matter what he’d chosen, I still loved him. I couldn’t abandon him to the Order. We had to go back.

  I started toward our camp, but stopped as the glint of steel reflected the moon’s light back at me.

  Aerden and I stopped as a dozen soldiers formed a circle around us.

  I turned, studying the group of guards, my eyes locked on the insignia emblazoned on their chest.

  A phoenix.

  My father’s insignia.

  You Have To Let Her Go

  Brighton Manor burned while I held Courtney’s body in my arms. The ice had melted from around her, and I could barely feel a pulse.

  Jackson must have been with her. That was the only explanation for the ice, but where was he now? I couldn’t handle the thought that he might be in there somewhere, burning, with no way to help him.

  Who could have done this? Getting through our defenses would have taken time. An army of witches, just like those who had attacked the domed city. There would have been some evidence of an army. Some warning. They couldn’t have just vanished into thin air.

  Beyond the flames, someone called my name.

  I turned to see my sister, Angela, running from the woods, her eyes wide as she scanned the destruction.

  “I’m here,” I said. “Quickly! I don’t think she’s breathing.”

  Angela knelt at my side and pulled Courtney from my arms. She pressed the girl’s damp, cold body against her own and closed her eyes. A white light pulsed from her hands as she poured her healing into Courtney, but when she opened her eyes, I could see the truth before she even spoke.