Ascension

by Sadie Moss

  And the weave is helping. At least, I think it is. It’s grounding me, making it easier to keep my feet on the floor.

  But will it protect me from the light? Will my connection to this magic keep me from being blasted apart?

  Just a little longer, I assure myself, trying to ignore the painful pressure of the light on my body, the way the energy feels like it wants to rip me into pieces. I wear the weave like an armor, moving my wrists forward and ahead of me in the hope it might lessen some of the pain.

  I’ve just placed my foot onto the second step when I lose my grip on the weave.

  I don’t even know what breaks my grasp. Standing inside the light is a strange experience, with the weightlessness and the thick viscosity of the air around me, but I do have a firm grip on the threads of magic I’m holding. I even think the weave is making the journey easier—not easy, just easier.

  But then in a single breath, the threads are torn from me by something outside my realm of control, and the light throws me back.

  I sail through the air, my scream lodged in my throat.

  I’m airborne for a long, frightening minute, long enough to brace myself for the impact, and then I hit the floor hard. Luckily for my skull, the trajectory throws me directly backward, and I skid across the carpet rather than the stone, escaping another knot on my head in exchange for some painful rug burns.

  Shock freezes me in place for a long moment. My heart is beating so fast it feels like it might crash through my ribs, and a sheen of sweat covers my skin.

  Farse! I thought I had it.

  That was the closest I’ve gotten since we arrived in this strange, empty place—only to be thrown out like trash.

  I stare at the ceiling high over my head, my thoughts whirling. Maybe Echo is wrong. There is no Weaver. Not now, maybe not ever. And it’s certainly not me.

  Echo appears over me, his face tight with worry. He offers me a hand up, and I take it, my fingers shaking even as I reach for his. I groan pitifully as he hauls me to my feet. Instead of letting me go to stand on my own, he pulls me into his arms and holds me.

  My elbows sting from the burn of sliding over the carpet, but I latch onto him anyway. His strong chest pressed against me, and his steady hands on my back root me firmly to my feet.

  “Maybe this isn’t such a good idea,” he says quietly after I’ve found my balance and settled against him. He presses a kiss to my hair, holding me tighter. “Do you want to stop? We can find another way.”

  Maybe it’s the defeat in his voice that gives me a surge of stubborn strength. Or maybe it’s my own farsing stubbornness. Either way, I’m not ready to give up—not yet. All of the hardest times in a person’s life end when they don’t give up.

  Pulling back, I catch his gaze and shake my head. “No. We’re going to do this.”

  “You’re right. We will.” Then he kisses me, slow and sweet, just a light peck of the lips that lingers.

  His lips are warm and soft, and a thrill of desire races through me as his fingers trail down my neck. Unconsciously, I sway into him, our bodies melding together. He cups the back of my neck and tugs me closer, deepening the kiss so that my head tilts up and my lips part beneath his.

  I get lost in the taste of him, drawing strength from our bond. From his belief in me.

  When we finally break apart, he gazes down at me like he’s looking at a miracle. Then he gives me a small smile. “Ready?”

  I nod. “I’m ready.”

  With a deep breath, I step away from Echo’s steadying arms and turn back to the throne to try again.

  20

  Time passes. Considering I have no concept of how time works in this realm, the only measurement I have are the constant eclipses. We begin to recognize the differences between each moon—one slightly pink, one blue, one so shiny it could be made of silver. Once we recognize the moons, it’s easier to understand that each carries its own cycle, and a bit of critical thinking helps us come up with the theory that five moons eclipsing is the equivalent of a day here, because then the moons roll back around and start their cycles again.

  But even then, there’s no way to know how much time has passed in Ironholde or on earth. For all we know, Kaius and Zelus have already destroyed everything I care about, all because I’m failing in my attempts to secure the throne.

  It’s been several days since our arrival. I’m exhausted. Bruised all over, beaten both inside and out.

  In their search of the grounds, Paris and Callum found a fountain that constantly bubbles with fresh water and a store room that seems to have a never dwindling stock of food. It’s as if this place was created to be self-sustaining, to exist on its own in the middle of this strange land until a new Weaver comes to claim his or her place.

  But I’m growing less and less convinced that person will be me.

  Nothing has changed. No matter how tightly I grasp the weave, or how hard I fight the light, I’m unable to breach the top stair and reach the platform.

  I’ve been up since the largest moon passed the sun this morning and have spent all day trying, listening to Echo’s increasingly far-reaching theories and letting him convince me that this is what’s going to work.

  When Callum and Echo fall into an argument over whether we should continue trying, I slip out of the throne room and leave them to it. I can’t handle the flood of emotions pouring from both of them. Not right now.

  The palace’s halls are tomb-like. My footsteps echo off high ceilings and bare walls, and as long as I stay on the exterior corridors, I don’t have to use the weave to light the torches. I follow the angled slants of golden sunlight on the floor until I reach the far wall, where the tallest turret rises from the corner of the castle.

  I ascend the turret’s staircase, absently weaving magic around my bruised elbow. There is no glass in the windows here, and as I circle past each narrow hole in the stone, a refreshing wind rolls around me. I take in deep lungfuls of the clear, crisp air and let it calm my anxious jitters.

  This tower has become my favorite place in the palace. Walking the steps into the sky feels like a rite of passage—like I’m walking through a portal into another world, but without the use of magic. The staircase spills onto a flat landing with a row of small windows all around the tower, and a short, narrow door directly ahead of the stairs opens onto a balcony.

  By the time I reach the balcony, the current eclipse has turned the landscape blue and silver. I wrap my fingers around the stone railing and gaze out over the realm, as mesmerized by its strange beauty as I was the first time I came up here. The maze twists and turns on the palace grounds below, a sea of shifting ivy and shadows, and just beyond it, I can see the cliff where we saw the Court of Ancient Power for the first time.

  This part of the realm never changes, but beyond the cliff, nothing stays the same. Some days, a vast desert stretches on the horizon. Other days, a thick forest. Once, I even thought I saw the glistening of a vast ocean. But here, in the palace and the maze and the small plot of land surrounding it, everything is soothingly constant.

  How did I come to be here? A girl from a small village on earth, now working toward taking a throne that could give her more power than all gods. How is this the course my existence took?

  “Mind if I join you?”

  Paris’s voice warms me from the inside out and drags me from my thoughts. I glance over my shoulder to find him leaning against the stone tower as if he’s been there for hours.

  I incline my head, a smile curving my lips. “You’re more than welcome. You know that.”

  He draws up behind me, his arms circling my waist and tugging me back against him. I rest against his warmth, my own hands covering his as we gaze out over the land far below.

  “Get sick of their arguing too?” I tilt my head a little to look up at him.

  “Ah, no.” He chuckles. “That, I’m used to. We’ve been brothers too long. Arguments are a dime a dozen. Fifty percent off on the weekends.”

 
I laugh. We fall silent, and I trace my thumb over the soft skin at his wrist, relishing the feeling of being this close to him.

  Paris has hardly seemed himself in days. While he still stands with Echo that it’s a possibility I’m the Weaver, he often ends up being the voice of reason between his two brothers as they butt heads. I can’t remember the last time I was in his arms.

  As if he can read my thoughts, he brushes my hair away, exposing my shoulder and neck. He kisses the curve of my shoulder, then moves up to the space beneath my ear, before ending with a gentle kiss on my temple. I shiver and tighten my grip on his arms, hoping he won’t leave me.

  “Are you all right?” I ask softly.

  “I should be asking you that.”

  I grin. “But I asked you first.”

  His chest moves against my back as he sighs. “I wish we could do more to help you. You’re asking more of yourself than anyone should be expected to.”

  “Well, I have a history of doing just that,” I say, shaking my head as I pull a face.

  “I know.” His lips brush my hair. “That’s why it’s doubly unfair that the universe seems to keep asking more of you.”

  The knot of frustration in my chest tightens, but I try to keep my voice light. “I wouldn’t mind so much if it was asking for something I could actually do.”

  “Sage.” Paris’s voice is low. Sincere. “You should know that whether you’re able to become the Weaver or not, we will always be with you. Callum, Echo, and myself. We’ll fight by your side and do what we can to stop Kaius and Zelus before they harm more people.” His finger slides beneath my jawline, and he twists my face ever-so-slightly so that he can kiss the edge of my lips. “Even if it’s a losing fight, none of us will ever stop fighting for—and with—you.”

  I turn in his arms and capture his lips, my spirit buoyed by his support. With every failed attempt to claim the throne, I’ve had to think more and more seriously about what we’ll do if I’m not able to become the Weaver. Or if Echo is wrong about all of it, and I do manage to sit on the throne but nothing happens.

  What will we do then?

  Kaius still hates us. He’s still searching for us. He’s still planning a war with Zelus. And Zelus is still neglecting and abusing his people.

  We have to try to fix things, godly powers or no.

  And no matter what else happens, at least I’ll have my men with me in this fight.

  The balcony railing digs into my back as I pour every bit of the gratitude and love I feel into our kiss. Paris’s body is warm and hard against mine, and I’m starting to wonder just how hard the stone would be beneath me if I relieved him of his clothes. Or even better, maybe I could try to construct a bed of the weave. Bring each of my men up here for a much-needed break beneath the eclipsing sun.

  Before I can drag him bodily to the floor, he breaks away from the kiss and presses his forehead to mine. “You can do this. You have it in you. I know it, Sage.”

  I’ve fisted my hands in his soft tunic and am ready to drag him back to my lips when I register what he said.

  You have it in you.

  Those five words tickle something in my brain, and goose bumps ripple all over my body. I stop mid-lean, my eyes widening.

  “In it!” I gasp, letting go of Paris’s shirt. I nearly topple over the railing and have to grab for the stone, while my messenger snatches at my arms to steady me.

  “What’s that now?” His brows furrow.

  I grab his shoulders and laugh out loud, my head spinning. It’s such a simple little thing, but it has to be the answer. I’ve been doing this all wrong, every attempt I made to approach the throne doomed from the start.

  Gods, I hope I’m right about this.

  “We have to go back down to the throne room,” I say breathlessly, the words all running together in my haste. “I have to try something.”

  My heart bursting with love as excitement and adrenaline surge through my veins, I slide my hands to both sides of his ridiculously handsome face and give him another hard, fast kiss. Then I race for the stairs.

  “Try what?” Paris calls after me as he follows me through the doorway into the stairwell.

  I don’t answer him. I can’t yet. The idea he sparked is growing and strengthening in my mind, but I’m still a little afraid to say it out loud—as if it’s a rabbit on a plain, ready to dart away if I speak too loudly.

  But I need to try it. I need to see if I’m right.

  I take the tower stairs at a sprint, feeling as if I’m flying.

  I’ve been trying to use the weave from the outside, like I’ve always done. And I’ve been trying to approach the light from the outside too—trying to force my way through it as if it’s a wall of stone.

  But that’s not what the throne is looking for. The throne wants the Weaver.

  Which means the throne wants a leader who can get inside the weave. Become a part of it.

  When I re-enter the ballroom, Callum and Echo are facing off over the plush carpet, their arms crossed and scowls on their faces. I barrel past them, cutting between them as I race up the carpeted walkway. They both leap back, but I don’t acknowledge them.

  I’m on a mission to prove myself right, and in the process, prove Echo’s theory right.

  “What’s going on?” I hear Echo ask as Paris enters the room.

  My blond soulmate sounds bemused and slightly worried. “Your guess is as good as mine.”

  The light around the throne blooms into being, and I stop short of walking into it. Closing my eyes, I reach into the weave. Magic sparks against my fingertips, and I let it dance over my skin.

  But instead of drawing the strands down to me, wrapping them around my hands, I pull myself up.

  And in.

  Suddenly, I am nothing but hot magic. I slip into the weave as if it were tailor made to fit me. I am power and light, even more so than the light that illuminates the throne.

  The weave is in me, and I am in it.

  I give over all sensation to it and ignore that I have a body, ignore that my fingers are aflame. My eyes burn with victorious tears as I ascend the short, shallow stairway and step onto the dais.

  Then I draw up to the throne, turn around, and sit.

  The light explodes.

  Power like nothing I’ve ever felt before floods through me and around me. I hear a scream over the rush of energy in my ears, and I realize with a strange detachment that the sound is coming from me. I cling to the arms of the throne, sitting among a harsh, too-white column of pure energy. My hair whips around my face, and my skin feels as if it might be torn from my body.

  I lose focus on certain parts of me—I can’t feel my arms, then my feet, then my torso winks out of existence. I become one with the weave, one with the power of the throne.

  My body is being torn apart, reassembled, rebuilt from the power.

  While I’m bathing in this absolute power, I realize everything I’ve ever known is drawn into question. The meaning of the universe, of life on earth and the gods in the afterworld… it’s all just right outside my realm of comprehension, but it’s so close I can touch it. The knowledge is like an aphrodisiac, an elixir that fills me with strength.

  I am strength, I realize, and reach for the knowledge.

  But before I can take it for my own, something else sneaks in. I sense Kaius, and then another presence I don’t recognize, but a godly one, nonetheless. The light tells me it’s Zelus, and that the two foolish gods are about to face off.

  The war is about to begin.

  This particular inevitability has been on my mind for so long, it’s become like a ghost that haunts me—a horrifying bedtime story of a different world and life. But the light directs my attention to the war, showing me clearly that the moment I’ve dreaded for so long is finally come.

  When Kaius and Zelus go head to head, the fight will spill over into earth and result in mass devastation.

  Thousands of humans will die.

  And the war
is beginning…

  Now.

  21

  I’m so stunned by the revelation, by the visions of destruction and bloodshed, that I let go of my connection with the weave.

  Instantly, I fall out of the magic, and the light sears over my flesh in its absence. The throne burns beneath me, no less painful than if I were sitting in a raging fire, and I surge to my feet. Before I can run from the light of my own accord, the energy hurls me away, as if I’m an interloper who tricked her way onto the throne.

  I brace for the hard landing on the stone floor, but strong arms catch me instead. My momentum sends us both crashing to the floor, though Callum takes the brunt of the blow, judging from the sound of the wind expelling from his lungs.

  Our bodies tumble over each other, and when we finally come to a stop, I roll off him and land awkwardly on my hands and knees.

  After my experience inside the light, I’m dazed, and a sinking feeling inside tells me that whatever it was I needed to do to become the Weaver, I never got to finish the process. If I had, the light wouldn’t have tossed me aside like nothing more than garbage. But I can’t afford even another moment to gather my wits about me or mourn what should have been. We’re out of time, and entire villages and cities are about to be wiped out.

  I scramble to my feet, listing precariously to the side before I find my balance. Echo and Paris are right behind me, arms outstretched, but I wave off their assistance. The three of them come together in front of me, nearly identical looks of concern on their faces, and I briefly wonder what they witnessed while I was on the throne.

  “We have to go,” I pant. I want to give an explanation, to tell them what I saw inside the light and how power thrummed through my veins, but my heart is hammering out of my chest. We don’t have time for an explanation. We need to get back to the afterworld and head this battle off before it even begins.

  Echo looks taken aback for a brief moment, but he recovers quickly. “Now?”