by Megg Jensen
“She?” Chase asked.
“Eloh. Who else? She said I have to kill everyone.” I was getting tired of her frantic begging. Didn’t she know I was doing the best I could to figure it all out?
“Was that when your heart stopped beating?” Chase’s hand gripped my shoulder, almost a little too tight.
“She did say something about losing her magic. Maybe it was an accident?” I offered, unsure what any of it meant. My heart was beating strong. I didn’t feel like I’d just died. “Maybe my heartbeat was just faint?”
Chase glanced back at Xaxier. “Tell her.”
Xaxier shook his head. “No, you died. Your soul left your body. I saw it. Then right before you awoke on the floor, it flew back in.”
I looked to Chase, sure Xaxier had lost it, but Chase nodded his head in agreement. “I didn’t see your soul. When you started breathing, your chest lurched up toward the ceiling, as if it was accepting something from the universe into it. Do you feel any different?”
I waited for my body to give me a sign that something had changed within me, but I felt the same way I had only moment before we’d contacted Bryden. “No, I don’t. Eloh didn’t tell me anything new. She only sounded frantic this time. I don’t know if we’re running out of time or if it’s her. All she does is make everything more confusing than it was before. If that’s even possible.”
A knock at the door interrupted the conversation. They needed to take their focus off of their mistake and get back to reality. I hadn’t died. Just passed out or something.
After a nod from Chase, Xaxier opened the door. The little girl from the stables stood in the doorway, clutching flowers in her fist. She held out her other hand toward me.
Even though I was weak from whatever had just happened to me, my instincts told me to go with her. I struggled to stand up, but found I was weaker than I had thought. My legs felt like jelly.
Silently, she walked over to me, placed her open hand on my legs, and closed her eyes. Warmth traveled from my toes up to my hips. My strength came back immediately. It was possible I felt even better than I had when I woke up this morning.
She took a step back. Her blonde hair rested over her face, covering most of her eyes. Her palms stretched out to me, oriented toward the ceiling.
“Are those flowers for Lianne?” Chase asked her.
She didn’t move. Didn’t acknowledge he’d even spoken. Her hand held steady. I reached out, tentatively, placing my palm atop hers.
My eyes were forced to close. I felt her presence inside my mind, similar to communing with Eloh, but it was gentler. I searched around, unsure what was happening. Did she have something to tell me? Something that was too hard for her to say?
Inside her mind, I found nothing. It was as clear as a cloudless summer morning.
My eyes snapped open. “You’re the one I’ve been looking for. The one whose mind is clear.”
A smile spread across her face. Then she collapsed in my arms.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
I reached out, catching Wren before she hit the floor. The flowers fell from her limp hand, scattering around until my floor resembled an untouched meadow.
“What’s wrong with her?” I looked up at Xaxier. “Is this the same thing that happened to me?”
Xaxier nodded as he dropped to his knees. I held her in my arms. She was only a small child, I could have cradled her like a baby. Xaxier laid two fingers on her throat, looking for a pulse. He looked up at me. “She’s alive, but barely.”
I let out a sigh of relief. “I don’t understand what’s happening. If she’s the one I’m looking for, then what comes next?” My heart pounded like a trapped beast.
“Did you find anything in the book?” Chase asked. “Did you learn anything?”
I shook my head. “I didn’t get that far.” Something vibrated at my waist. I felt around, realizing the movement came from my bag. The dagger!
I pulled the drawstring and the bag spilled open. The jewels on the dagger spread streaks of color through the room like a rainbow. It clattered on the stone floor.
“I don’t know what to do!” My hands shook as I began to panic. “I wish someone would just tell me how to solve all of this.”
A light burst in the room and Johna stepped out of a portal. She glanced at the child in my arms. “The Malborn are here. Portals have been spotted opening all around the castle ground. Time has run out, Lianne. Do you have a solution yet?”
“No,” I said through gritted teeth. “I don’t know how to sever everyone, but I did find the one whose mind is clear. It’s Wren. I just don’t know what it means! Eloh told me to find her and every single time she tried to talk to me, I pushed her aside, thinking I had more important things to do. She just came to me, then passed out.”
Bright flashes of light poured into my chambers through the window.
“What’s going on out there?”
“I told you, the Malborn are here. They’re porting in right now. Their military will follow their gifted. They want you, Lianne. They’ll kill anyone in their path.”
“No! This has to stop! I’ll just give myself up to them.” I knew it wasn’t the right thing to do, but I still wasn’t sure how to sever them. Without that, I had no power against them.
“I won’t let you do it,” Chase said.
Johna stepped up next to him. “Neither will I. You have a destiny to fulfill and we’re going to make sure you do it.”
“Then tell me what to do,” I begged. “I’ll sacrifice anything. Please.”
Johna looked at Chase, then back at me. “Then do what you know you must. Gather the girls in Chase’s picture. Use your dagger. Make the sacrifice.”
“No,” I whispered. “I won’t kill anyone. What purpose will it serve?”
“We don’t know, but if you trust Chase’s visions, then do as they direct you.” Johna sank to the floor next to Wren and me. She took Wren’s hand in hers. “She knew what was to come. Why do you think she came to you?”
“I don’t know, but what child would willingly walk to sacrifice?” I brushed her light blond hair off her face. She was too sweet, too innocent, to involve herself in this mess. How could she even fully understand what she was doing?
“A child whose mind is clear. A child who isn’t muddied by the weight of the world yet. A child who understands that sometimes we’re put here for a reason. A child who isn’t afraid to meet her destiny.”
Another knock at the door interrupted our conversation. Chase opened it, and a group of young women stood in the hallway. “Let us in.” It was a voice I knew.
“No,” I said under my breath. “No, no, no.”
The door burst all the way open and my mother strode into the room. “Here are the initiates, Lianne. I’ve brought them to you.”
Xaxier and Chase held up their hands, prepared to do battle with my mother. A line of girls followed her into the room, their eyes vacant, bodies moving, but slack. Anger boiled in me when I saw the last girl in line, Sebrina. Our mother had used her again.
“Why are you here?” I demanded of Kiran. She stood behind the line of girls. No one had a clear shot to trap her.
“It’s all about the magic. You need to sacrifice these girls to replenish it. Then we will be the most powerful people in the world. The gods have been whispering in my ear since you were just a babe in my womb. They told me you would be the Vessel. Everything I’ve done has been for them and for you. Do not fight with the gods. Do not anger them. Do as they ask and we will both be rewarded.”
“You tried to kill me months ago.”
Kiran shrugged. “A momentary lapse in judgment.”
She was totally nuts. I glanced over at the dagger. The colors projecting from the gems undulated in my chambers, fighting with the flashes of light coming from the battle outside my window. “Go away. I won’t sacrifice any of these girls. Not today, not ever. Especially not my own twin sister!”
My mother’s cackle raced through m
y chambers like a thousand sharp icicles. “But it’s too late for your friend Mags. The gods told me she was watching me and reporting about my actions. I had to do away with her.”
My hands trembled. “And Trevin?”
“The babe will live. He’s in his crib waiting for me, his new mother, to raise him.”
A loud crack of magic burst from my side. I glanced away from my mother and saw Xaxier’s hands lifted, shaking with anger.
“You’ll never hurt anyone again, Kiran!”
My mother shrieked as his magic burst from his palms, a streak of black death sped toward her. She flew through the air, his magic pinning her against the wall. She struggled against his grasp, fighting to retaliate.
“Lianne!” She screeched my name, but I held steady. My heart screamed at me, telling me to save her, but I knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that she would never reform.
I turned my back on her, giving Xaxier unspoken permission to do as he pleased. Her wretched screams subsided to a whimper before a final sigh of death swept over all of us.
Anger built up in my stomach, stoking the fires I’d worked so hard to control. I directed the magic now. It didn’t tell me what to do anymore. I breathed in deeply, knowing that if I could go through with severing, it would never bother me again.
I gazed at the girls milling around my room. None of them knew why they had come, only that they felt they needed to. A spark in my mind alerted me to a presence hovering in the corner. No one else seemed to see the shaky shadow either. I couldn’t ignore her. The peacock feathers shimmered in the air like dust motes in the sun. Eloh wasn’t fully there, just an apparition.
You must do it. You must do it now. As before, I heard her voice in my head.
I don’t know what to do!
Pick up the dagger. Follow your heart. Do what must be done, Lianne.
The dagger lay on the floor next to me. My hand trembled. Slowly I reached for it, knowing that the moment I held it in my hand, I wouldn’t have the strength to pull away. Once I joined with it, my flesh to the gemstones, I wouldn’t be able to stop the devastating consequences.
I paused, my fingertips just inches from the dagger.
My wrist flicked out, my fingers wrapped around the hilt of the dagger, sealing all of our fates.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
My vision changed the second my skin came in contact with the gems. Eloh no longer hovered in the corner, a mirage among the reality. Now she took on full flesh while the rest of them faded into the air, shimmering like an object trapped under water.
“Are you ready for your destiny?” she asked me. Her lips moved as if she was flesh and blood like me.
“What do I have to do to sever magic from my world? Are you ready to give me solid answers?”
She nodded. “Follow your heart. Quickly! Before it’s too late!”
Other people materialized around her. Surrounded by golden auras, each of them stepped next to one of the girls in my room. Then they melded into their bodies, becoming one with them. “What’s going on? No! These girls did nothing to me. I’ll never hurt them!”
“Just do as I say.” Eloh backed away from me, stretching an arm out toward Wren.
“She’s just a little kid! Leave her alone!” I reached out, but in whatever plane we existed, I couldn’t touch her, couldn’t stop her. Eloh’s essence merged with Wren’s. Wren looked at me, a smile spreading across her face.
“Finally, I have a voice.” Her hand caressed her throat. “My whole life I’ve been trying to talk, but I couldn’t. Except with you. Thank you for bringing me a voice, Lianne.”
She reached out a small hand to me. I hesitated a moment, then took it in my free hand. Her hand felt warm, alive, while the power of death radiated through the dagger, into my other hand.
“It’s okay,” she whispered. “Do it.” She glanced at the dagger.
“No. I won’t kill you.”
“Kill me?” Instead of a look of abject horror, Wren’s smile only grew. “You’ll be giving me a new life.” Her arms spread out. “You’ll give all of us a new life. Follow your heart.”
I narrowed my eyelids and stared harder at her. Who was I talking to? Wren? Or Eloh, who’d somehow merged with her? Was it Wren’s true wish to see me follow through or Eloh’s, who’d been prodding me?
Another girl turned around. Sebrina. She smiled too. I couldn’t figure out why they all seemed more than happy to convince me to kill them.
“Sacrifice isn’t always what you think,” Sebrina said, walking closer and standing next to Wren. “Sometimes the sacrifice isn’t in the life lost, it’s in the life gained.”
Sebrina reached out, wrapping her hand around my fist – the fist that held the dagger. “Do it, Lianne. Use the dagger to complete the ritual.”
“I don’t even know what you’re asking me to do! I still don’t understand any of this. All I wanted was to sever magic from our world.”
“Great magic requires great sacrifice,” Wren said. She flickered in and out of reality for a moment. I saw the peacock feather, the frustration in Eloh’s face as she tried to convince me that Wren’s words were her own. But they weren’t.
Lies from the mouths of gods. Did they think I was so foolish? Then the true answer dawned on me. They were trying so hard to convince me to go through with severing, yet they’d entered the bodies of young women. Eloh had outright admitted to me that her power was waning. Were humans sucking the magic away from the gods?
Is this why they were using us? Pitting us against each other? Dread washed over my gut. It wasn’t just the Malborn I feared. Now I believed in Chase’s gods and I feared them more than any mortal with a slim grasp of magic fighting a childish battle.
“Do it, Lianne! Do it before your people die,” Wren gasped.
My hand trembled as I pulled it from Sebrina’s tight grasp.
Wren nodded, her eyes wide with anticipation. A small smile spread across her face as she gazed at my chest, as if she could see straight into my soul.
I turned the dagger on myself and plunged it into my heart.
Chapter Thirty
Screams ripped through the air. The universe shredded into a million pieces, wisps of the world undulating in the cosmic breeze as the gods were torn asunder.
Hope filled my essence, replacing something I’d struggled against since my sixteenth birthday. The magic, the so-called gift from the gods that made me special. The same gift that spread chaos and destruction.
I bled magic. Blue, purple, and red, fiery red, oozed from me, spread out, and then disappeared into the ether.
Wails echoed in my mind, blocking out all thought. I floated in a dream, a lonely cloud on the edge of the violent, stormy sky. A large bird caught me and I rested on the wings of darkness, narrowly avoiding the bolts of lightning snapping all around me.
No, not lightning. Something else. Something familiar.
My hand fluttered out, grasping at wisps of clouds, but unable to gain purchase. My fingertips danced in the breeze. My hair billowed around my shoulders, fluctuating between silver in the darkness and red when lightning lit up the ether. I floated, existed, here and there, nowhere.
“This wasn’t the way it was to happen!” A voice screeched through the air, assaulting my ears, sending painful jolts through my brain. I winced. “You were supposed to make her sacrifice the initiates. Without the Vessel we are destroyed. We are weak. We have died.”
I was confused. Was the voice berating me? Or someone else?
“Magic was killing them, forcing them to take sides. Lianne chose.” My name! This new voice knew me. I reached out again, thrusting with my aching muscles, still unsure if I could even control my body in this strange place.
“We do not condone choice in humans.” A deep bass resounded, adding fear to the conversation. “They are there to worship us. The magic was a gift.”
“It was a curse. You forced me into changing the world, and now someone better than me, someone who was
able to navigate through your manipulations while remaining true to her heart, has changed it all. Without your Vessel, the magic is null.”
“We are dying.”
Calming myself, I reached deep inside for my fire. I struggled to harness it, as it continued to slip away from me.
I gathered all of my anger and focused on it. Then, bit by bit, I ripped it to shreds with the love I had for Chase, Sebrina, and even the misguided emotions for my mother. I pushed as hard as I could toward where I thought my mouth should be.
“You deserve to die. Not us.” Without moving my lips, I had found a way to respond to the disembodied voices.
Silence overtook the angry conversation, then laughter followed.
“She’s found a way to get past the barriers you set up.” I knew that voice. Eloh. The harder I pushed in my mind, the more I understood.
It was Eloh arguing with the other gods. I could hear them, which meant I was probably dead. Wishing I could see my body, I needed to know if I’d succeeded in killing myself. I couldn’t sacrifice those girls. My only hope had been that my death would be enough.
“She took away the magic, our gift to the world of humans. Without the Vessel, we cannot continue to feed their desperate need for magic. We will not survive!”
I imagined curling up my hands into fists. “I never consented to being a conduit for your magic. If my death steals it away from the world and from you, then so be it.”
A loud crack struck my mind, then blackness followed.
Chapter Thirty-One
My eyelids fluttered, but they didn’t fully open. Too exhausted to do much more, I laid still, waiting.
“Is she going to be okay?” The nervous voice caressed my ears, reminding me of someone I once knew. I couldn’t recall a name, or a face, but something about it tugged at my heart.
There was no response, at least not one I could hear. I was curious too. Was I going to be okay? I wasn’t sure. There was something wrong with me, I just couldn’t remember what it was. I could have opened my eyes, but it seemed beyond my physical abilities.