L.O.S.T. Trilogy Box Set

by R. S. Collins

  At last, the blue slither fully entered the Path, and Bren and I closed the fissure behind us.

  Bren was sweating and breathing hard, and I could see a little blood on his bandaged hand. He steadied himself and glared at Acaw. “Have you thought about how we’re getting this brute into the Sacred Lands? There’s no way it’s fitting through that little hole.”

  Acaw’s only answer was to turn his back and start down the Path, the charms on his staff giving a little music to the faltering hum of the magical energy.

  “Why does he talk to you and not me?” Bren asked grouchily as we herded the smaller slither, leaving Garth to lead the larger beast.

  “Because he’s an elfling male.”

  “So if you had hired an elfling female servant long ago, she’d talk to me better than you?”

  “Of course. Right before she poisoned you, wrapped you up, and left you in a cave to feed her young.”

  Silence. And then, “You’re pulling my leg.”

  I didn’t answer him, but I couldn’t help laughing. The sound was strange in the increasingly silent Path. It was like the longer we walked it, the worse it got.

  “Something is off about this place,” Bren muttered. His hand dropped automatically to his sword, but he grimaced when bandage met hilt. “As soon as we’re through with this rescue, I’ll bring Todd and figure it out. Maybe it needs repairs.”

  The mere thought of the magnitude of the next problem before we finished tackling the mess at hand—it was enough to render me silent until we finished the hike to the entrance to the Sacred Lands.

  When Acaw tapped his staff against the Path, two hinged gates appeared, taller than the largest slither, and twice as wide.

  “So why did I have to climb through a hobbit hole the first time?” Bren groused.

  “The entrance was as large as necessary,” Acaw allowed as he used his staff to open the gates.

  Bren snorted. “Necessary for whom? A gnome? I thought maybe it was so little to keep the Erlking from squeezing through.”

  Acaw greeted this with a sigh as he escorted the harpy through the gates.

  I grabbed the smaller slither’s lead rope and tugged. “Bren, the Erlking is a shapeshifter. He could assume the form of a cockroach and skittle through a bolt crack if he chose to do so.”

  “Yeah, yeah, yeah.” Bren dragged the blue slither through the gates, which swung shut behind us. “I knew that.”

  “Once the oldeFolke managed to stop his killing of humans and ward him into this realm, they set spells to keep him here. All magical beings were then charged to stay clear except in extreme need, and never to bring through a host who would be vulnerable to his tricks.” The little slither finally cooperated, which was more than I can say for Bren’s charge. “Witches are immune, and oldeFolke, and natural magical beasts like the slithers and harpies—so it’s not a problem for us.”

  Bren held his hand out to help me mount our slither, but he had a funny look on his face. “I’m a halfblood, remember? Is that a problem?”

  “Don’t worry.” I took his hand, then kissed his cheek. “Your blood is strong, half or not, and we’re together. Our magic will be enough to defeat him if he dares challenge us.”

  A few hours later, my cheeks were warmed from the sun, and I felt refreshed from the fresh air. If possible, the Sacred Lands seemed even more beautiful than I remembered from my first trip through.

  The harpy made a series of fusses and clicks I had heard before.

  “Fly faster,” Acaw translated Garth’s instructions with his usual composure, even though we were sailing above the ground at a blistering pace.

  “What a pain,” Bren muttered in my ear. He was sitting behind me, arms wrapped around my waist, holding me close, reminding me of when we first flew on a broom together. Our slither called himself Firestorm, and Acaw’s dragon called himself Ironblood.

  Using our combined magic, we had fashioned an aerodynamic shield to deflect the cold and the rush of wind, and to keep communications easier. For our efforts, we were treated to a non-stop dose of Garth’s dissatisfaction with how long it had taken for us to leave L.O.S.T. and how slowly slithers flew.

  We were all being patient. After all, if our children were on the line, we would be in just as big a hurry as he was.

  “So what’s the deal with Sherise and Helden?” Bren’s question sounded casual, but I could tell he had been pondering it right along with me.

  “I’m not sure,” I admitted. “All I know for certain is that they are both heirs to very old, very powerful witching lines with unique gifts. Sherise is the Ash of Ash, a family known for prophecy and clarity of sight. Helden is the Hartzell of Hartzell, a bloodline famous for grace amongst conflict, one of the few groups of witches welcome amongst almost any clan or tribe, olde or modern.”

  Bren snuggled me a little closer, making me smile. “They seemed to handle Todd well. I think he has his hands full with the both of them.”

  “I think its Helden and Sherise who have the handful. Your brother needs work, Bren.”

  He let out a breath, warm against my ear. “I know. After the rescue, after the Path, he and I need some serious guy-time. I think he’s still really bugged about Mom. Nire. You know.”

  “Has he always been so difficult?”

  “Nah. Well, a little. High-spirited, impulsive, big-mouthed. Don’t say it.”

  I leaned my head against Bren’s shoulder. “You’re living proof that boys like Todd can grow up to be kings.”

  He coughed, and I wondered if he might be embarrassed by the compliment. I would have expected a smart remark about his incredible prowess, but his silence was quite endearing.

  “So, back to these two girls. Do you think it’s a fluke that we’ve got two witch mini-queens around the same age, showing up in L.O.S.T. about the same time?”

  “Goddess, Bren. Let’s keep to one problem at a time. You’re getting as obsessive as me.”

  “Hey, I resemble that remark.” He kissed the side of my head.

  “The answer, by the way, is no. I don’t think it’s happenstance, but I can’t figure out the significance either.”

  “I’m heartbroken. You really don’t know everything.”

  “Shut up.”

  The harpy made his fusses and clicks, a little differently this time.

  “You are annoying humans,” Acaw translated smoothly.

  That night, after our dinner, the harpy retired to sleep with the slithers, saying he felt more comfortable with beasts closer to his own design. Briefly, I felt sorry for Garth, and for all creatures who were neither truly human or truly animal. I couldn’t begin to understand how confusing life must be for them. When he started snoring, I forgot most of that pity, wondering instead how I would ever get to sleep.

  Acaw, who had agreed upon third watch, wasn’t exactly sleeping silently either. He breathed in and out, and on each exhale, his crow-brother made bizarre bird grumbles until I wanted to bang my head from the sound.

  But instead I relaxed into Bren’s arms. Stars glittered through the tree canopy and moonlight gave everything a silvery glow. We were sitting before a small campfire that crackled, hissed, and popped. Flames flickered before us and I watched them, almost mesmerized by their magical dance. Despite the snoring from the nearby beasts, the night and everything about it felt romantic as I snuggled into Bren’s embrace. I was back with my champion, my love, and this was truly the first real time we’d had alone.

  “Where do they live, anyway? The harpies.” Bren’s voice was low, as if not to wake anyone, as he nodded in the direction of the snoring Garth, who was topped only by the snoring slithers.

  “Harpies live everywhere,” I whispered, leaning into Bren as he tightened his arm around my shoulder. “They just keep to themselves, usually in the oldest of the older Sanctuaries. As time has moved on, they have become more scarce. Their caves and hunting grounds have been laid waste, and they aren’t exactly popular, even amongst the oldeFolke. Most
of them live here, in fact. In the Sacred Lands. It’s the best place for them.”

  “So, when we rescue these kidlings, Garth and his kids can just… go? Find their own way home?”

  “Yes.”

  Bren relaxed a fraction. “At least something is easy.”

  “Hush. You’re teasing the Goddess.”

  He gave me a tighter squeeze. “Guess I shouldn’t mention that I think it’s weird we haven’t seen the Erlking?”

  “Stop it!” I elbowed him.

  “I’m serious.” He bit the top of my ear.

  I shivered at the same time I threw him another elbow, firmer this time. “Me, too.”

  “You are annoying humans,” Acaw said sleepily, then turned over and covered both his own head and his crow-brother’s with his blanket.

  Bren leaned toward the fire and stared at the elfling. “Was he translating?”

  “Uh, no,” I whispered, doing all I could not to break into loud laughter.

  Resting my head against his shoulder, I sighed. “I can’t believe we’re going back to Talamadden.”

  Did I say that out loud?

  Bren tensed. “I can’t believe I’m letting you go back there. I won’t leave you, Jazz. This time if you get stuck there, you’re stuck with me, too.”

  I tilted my face up to smile at Bren, but caught my breath when I saw the look in his warm brown eyes. He was studying me with a gaze so intense, so filled with longing, and something more, that it took my breath away.

  “I wish...” His voice trailed away for a moment, but his gaze never faltered. “I wish we had more time together. Just you and me. Alone.”

  “What about now?” I whispered. “We’re alone.”

  Bren’s gaze cut to the snoring slithers, Garth, and Acaw, then back to me. “It’s not the same.” He shook his head and his silky hair brushed my cheek. “We’re heading into danger again, to death’s haven and God knows what we’ll have to face. I want you home. Safe. With me.”

  I reached up and cupped one of his cheeks, and the light stubble tickled my palm. “Wherever we are, whatever happens, I will always feel safe with you.”

  I drew him to me, and his mouth gently took mine. That kiss was unlike any kiss we had ever shared. A tingling sensation expanded deep in the pit of my stomach and my arms trembled as I wrapped them around Bren’s neck. He tasted of the honeyed sweetcake he’d eaten after dinner and his scent of man and the outdoors surrounded me.

  It struck me then, full and completely. Bren was no longer the boy I had trapped and taken onto the Path. He wasn’t impulsive or irresponsible, or any of the things I used to yell at him when I was angry. He was a true and great King of the Witches. He was a man now.

  And what was I?

  I had survived death, turned loose of so many obsessions, and come back to embrace life. Along my journey I had become—what? A true queen? A woman?

  The thought sat strangely inside me, terrifying and exciting, wrong and right all at the same time.

  When Bren pulled away from our kiss, I felt the resonance between us. By the look in his beautiful eyes, I knew he’d felt it, too. For all we had been through together, this one moment outshined the rest.

  Somehow, everything had just changed.

  “Jazz...” He hesitated, and his throat moved as he swallowed. “I know we’re still young. But we’re not too young to be king and queen.” Bren reached up with his good hand and brushed his knuckles across my cheek. “I mean to really be king and queen.”

  My heart pounded so hard my chest ached. I swallowed, too. “Exactly what are you trying to say?”

  I asked, even though I knew it with everything I had. Hearing it out loud, hearing it from him, felt so important.

  He stroked my cheek again and gave me that crooked smile of his that made the fluttering in my belly intensify. “You know what I’m saying, Jazz.” He brushed his lips softly over mine then whispered. “When we finish this, when everything is back to normal…” He paused again and gave a soft laugh. “As normal as it can be for the King and Queen of the Witches.”

  “Then what?”

  “I want you to be my real and true queen, Jazz.” His gaze deepened as his lips hovered above mine. “I want you to marry me.”

  I swear my heart skipped two, three beats. He’d said it, he’d really said it. I tightened my arms around his neck and buried my face in his tunic. The leather smell of his shirt mixed with the smoky odor of the fire made my eyes ache. No, they ached because of the tears that hovered at the back of my eyes. At that moment I was so confused. I wanted with all my heart to say Yes! when my head told me No. I had barely turned seventeen, and Bren was just eighteen now. We were too young, there were too many journeys lying ahead of us.

  But why couldn’t we take them together, bound to each other for all times?

  Because this time you might not make it out of Talamadden, Jasmina Corey. You’ll likely not survive a second traveling in death’s haven. And Bren… No matter what, he must live.

  “Oh, Goddess,” I said aloud, without meaning to, and this time a tear did roll down my cheek.

  “What’s wrong?” He brushed my hair behind my ear. “You love me, don’t you?”

  Even though I wanted to keep my face hidden in his shirt, I forced myself to release him and to draw myself away. I wanted to cling to him forever, but that couldn’t be. Not now. Not yet. Maybe not ever.

  “Hey.” Bren reached up and wiped away the single tear with his thumb. His brown eyes searched mine, and I saw both love and confusion in his gaze. “You do love me?”

  “With all my heart.” I brought his good hand to my chest so he could feel the pound of it beneath his fingers. “But right now we’re facing too much to make such a big decision. Let’s wait until we’re back in L.O.S.T., and everyone is safe again. Then we’ll talk about permanence. About marriage.”

  For a long moment he was quiet, then he gave a slow nod. “All right.” He slid his hand from where it rested above my beating heart, up until his fingers were wrapped in my long hair, and he drew me to him again. “But when we do get back, just realize that I’m not taking no for an answer.”

  The coolness of the forest wrapped around me and I snuggled against Bren’s chest. We were still sitting beside the fire, and the flames drew my eyes like an irresistible force. Warmth in the cold, light in the dark. My eyes drifted closed. I didn’t want to sleep, I wanted to stay awake as long as Bren did, but…

  Helden and Sherise sat in the clearing Sherise and I used for her training. They looked tired, rumpled-hair out of place, clothing askew, as if they had been hard at work. There were shadows all around them, including a particularly large lump heaped on the ground. I tried to focus on the lump, but I couldn’t make it out.

  “She said it might have power,” Sherise said, holding up her moonstone.

  Helden lifted her chain, letting her own heirloom jewel swing back and forth. It was an ancient starstone, of that I felt certain. “Grelda said the same of this. That if I learned the proper gaze, how to see through it and hold my intent, I could be stronger.”

  “Magnify the gift! Yes, that’s it.” Sherise cupped the moonstone. When she looked up at Helden, her eyes burned with startling intensity. She seemed more than powerful. Almost frightening. “We have to try it.”

  The clearing filled with nervous clucks and tuttings. Some of the dark shapes shifted, and I realized they were hags. Six or seven at least. But where were the hag-spirits?

  The bundle on the ground shifted, and one of the hags hissed, spreading out gnarled fingers and muttering a warding incantation.

  This seemed to startle Helden into action. She cradled her own stone and stared into it with a grim, disturbing frown. Very hag-like. Very menacing.

  Sherise did the same.

  The two stones flared, pitching light through the darkness as the girls turned their sharp, unnatural gazes toward the bundle.

  It shrieked and flailed against its bonds even as the hags
worked containments. I realized with sick dread what those bonds were. Snakey hag-spirits, clinging tight, trying to strangle the life out of their captive. A human. A boy.

  Dear Goddess.

  It was Todd!

  I woke with a gasp.

  “What is it?” Bren pulled me even closer. “You’re shaking.”

  “A dream.” I coughed. Yes, it was a dream. A nightmare. Obviously, I had drifted off to sleep in Bren’s embrace, feeling safe, and loved, and happier than I remembered ever feeling. The fire had burned low, and Bren had been too much of a gentleman to wake me by drawing on our combined magic to build it up again.

  The way his arm gripped me, and the slight movements he made, even the rise and fall of his chest told me that he hadn’t fallen asleep like I had. Certainly it was nearing time for Acaw’s and his crow-brother’s watch.

  “So?” Bren kissed the top of my head. “What did you see?”

  “It was Todd.” I sat up and pushed back from him, studying his handsome face in the firelight. “I dreamed Sherise, Helden, and some hags had taken him prisoner.”

  Bren frowned. “What, because he did something insane?”

  I shook my head. “In the dream, the girls—I think they were using their stones to hurt him.”

  “What?” Bren jumped up, wild-eyed.

  I got up with him, totally at a loss for what to say.

  At that second, low and beautiful singing began to filter through the forest in a mesmerizing cadence.

  “Oh, no,” Bren muttered as I turned a full circle, looking for the source of the sound.

  My heart pounded a little faster. I blinked sleep from my eyes and listened intently to the eerie song that was growing stronger, winding around us like a serpent coiling around its prey.

  A few feet away, Bren shivered as if taken by a strong and sudden chill. “The Erlking’s daughters.” He gripped the hilt of his sword with his right hand, then slowly drew the weapon from its sheath. Metal scraped against leather, loud to my ears and almost harsh against the beautiful, but certainly deadly song.