Illuminate

by Tracy Clark

  I pondered her words as I fought to stay conscious, then the strangest sound hit my ears—a tiny warrior yell coming toward us. I should know that sound, I thought, just as the blur of blond curls leaped over us, sending Finn and Saoirse soaring backward through the air and crashing into the fence bordering the garden. A group of Scintilla darted to us, surrounded us. I lost sight of Cora as they pushed me to sitting, infusing my aura with their life-affirming, numinous silver light.

  As before, the Arrazi surrounding us exchanged fearful glances at my daughter and took a few steps back from her raging aura, which extended in an enormous circle to prick each and every Arrazi with the searing needle of their own acrid medicine.

  “This looks like a battle between enemies,” Cora said, gaining her strength and her voice, though both were shaky and slightly off. She looked sadly on Finn and Saoirse and then to the circle of deadly people around us. “We didn’t start as enemies.”

  “What,” gasped Saoirse, using the fence to pull herself up, “do you mean by that? We are natural enemies!”

  Finn was coming to, and his eyes registered the clarity that had been gone minutes before. He looked confusedly at Saoirse, then limped toward us with his hands out. “I’m so sorry,” he said. “I didn’t have control.” His eyes were fixed on Cora, pleading with her to understand.

  “I know. She used her sortilege on you.”

  Finn wheeled around. “Sortilege? You were the one who took from Cora’s mother. The brutal one she wrote about. You were Arrazi all along and used your sortilege to convince me, your family, everyone that you hadn’t yet turned? Fooking hell…that night…you let yourself get weak so I’d believe it was the first time.”

  “Yes.” Saoirse didn’t look at him. Her focus was on Claire, the only person who’d been able to incite fear in all of the Arrazi. Cora spoke loud enough for everyone to hear, though her eyes didn’t leave Saoirse. Clearly, Saoirse controlled the pack of Arrazi until Claire became the bigger threat.

  Finn was still railing at Saoirse. “If he shared her with you, then you and my uncle Clancy worked together. What’d you promise him?”

  “Everything,” she said in a hollow voice. “He gave me the power to finally fight my mother. I promised him we’d oust her. I promised we’d rule our enemies, and we’d step out of mankind’s shadow. That was the only thing my mother and I ever agreed on. Finn, you don’t understand the power that’s being handed to us.”

  “By who?” Cora asked. “Cardinal Báthory?”

  “Saoirse, he’s using the Arrazi and has been planning to—”

  “Kill them now!” Báthory ordered the Arrazi as he strode up behind a line of them, using them as a shield. “You’ve had a taste of what’s been promised you. Fulfill your duty to me, and I will fulfill mine to you.”

  “But sir, the girl…” the woman who’d arrived with Saoirse said.

  Báthory misunderstood whom she meant. “Yes, Makenzie. The girl,” he said, narrowing his eyes. “Cora Sandoval must be the first to die.”

  A leaf wafted down from one of the trees and mystifyingly suspended in mid-air.

  My eyes moved to Finn and Cora, and they seemed just as suspended as the leaf, immobile, frozen, like the whole world and everyone in it was holding its breath. I tried to move but couldn’t. No one moved. Nothing on earth moved, it seemed, but Makenzie, who strode toward Cora. She smiled as she plunged her white aura into Cora’s chest and towed at the coiling string of silver.

  Cora didn’t even flinch.

  Makenzie had dropped a sortilege that stopped time, or froze us, I had no idea… I commanded my body to move, tried to scream. Being in my head was like banging on thick, soundproof glass, shrieking, and no one could hear. Cora was being murdered, and we could only watch, frozen in horror.

  As the last drop of Cora’s soul floated like a nacreous and iridescent pearl from her chest, she fell to the ground and her body pulsed, seemed to flicker—flicker and morph into a lovely girl whose hair swept across her collarbone and whose gray-green eyes now stared forever at the stars.

  The Arrazi woman’s triumphant smile slid from her face as she realized…

  It wasn’t Cora she’d killed.

  Sydney. They’d somehow switched, and Sydney had given her life to save Cora’s.

  The leaf fell to the ground.

  Like a great button was pushed, Makenzie’s sortilege broke. Cries rang out, and bodies rushed forward. Dun had his hands around the woman’s throat. She tried to penetrate his aura with her powerful white energy, but it hit and rolled away from him like he had a force field surrounding him. A shield. I looked for Cora and saw Mami Tulke staring intently at him, keeping him safe from Makenzie as he killed her with his bare hands and threw her limp body to the ground.

  “Why aren’t you attacking?” Báthory raged. “Do as I—” His words cut off as someone with a white aura pressed a gun to his temple. Hannah winked at us. She’d used her sortilege to alter her own aura and mix among the Arrazi. Brilliant. She’d gotten close enough to use my empty gun to silence the man who’d led this war. I wished it had a bullet and vowed I’d put one in his head before the day was done.

  Cora stepped from behind the trees. I sucked in my breath. They had to have switched when the Scintilla surrounded us after Finn and Saoirse attacked us. She kissed Claire’s cheek and whispered something in her ear. Claire nodded, and her white aura pressed harder on every Arrazi present. Even I could feel my daughter’s chilling power. We all could.

  When Cora reached Sydney’s body, she knelt and pressed her hand over Sydney’s heart and moved it in circles. “I’m so sorry you were hurt,” she said through tears. “You are so brave.” Like the Vatican video so many of us had seen, Cora’s eyes closed and she focused a funnel of energy into Sydney until Sydney was surrounded by glowing silver light and her long dark lashes fluttered.

  Cora gave one satisfied nod, smiled beatifically at the girl, then stood and cocked her head at Saoirse. Why focus on Saoirse in particular? Perhaps Cora thought hers was a heart she could touch. I seriously doubted it. Then Cora did something astonishing. She gave a most precious gift to her enemy—silver light. Saoirse’s eyes widened before welling up with tears. Like Cora had in the common room the day of the vote, she lit a spark that passed from Saoirse Lennon to each Arrazi one by one, gifting them with her essence.

  Some shook. Some cried openly.

  “Stop! Don’t give our enemies their powers!” I yelled to her. “You’re only making them more dangerous!”

  “We aren’t supposed to be enemies,” Cora said loudly. “We were not created as predator and prey. We’re made of the same stuff but were torn apart thousands of years ago.” I could hear the emotion she fought to hold in check. This was her moment to convince everyone what must be done.

  “Arrazi have forgotten what it is they truly hunger for. You mistake your need as need for the Scintilla’s spirit. The truth is, the hunger you feel is a desperate desire for wholeness. You weren’t created to kill us. You are meant to unite with us. To be one.”

  The Arrazi began whispering among them until one voice, Saoirse’s, called out the big question. “You want to convince the powerful to unite with the powerless. Why would we do that?”

  “Because we’re more powerful together. We had one job. That was to be the living embodiment of balance, of reconciliation of opposites. Our two energies are supposed to fuse to make a third that will heal this world and save mankind. The greatest power we can achieve is to be one.”

  Finn spoke to the crowd of Arrazi. “I know you loathe what you are—what you’re forced to do. You can make a different choice now. What felt toxic and inevitable isn’t. Please believe us. The truth was hidden for so long, but this is it. We are it.”

  “Finn,” Cora said softly. “Let’s do this. Someone has to be the first.”

  Chapter Sixty-One

  Cora

  My mother once said to me, Love is the strongest binding in this world. Love
is the key. I couldn’t believe it then. Hate and fear had infected my heart.

  Walking toward Finn with a fearful yet determined spirit and allowing him to take—no, not take—but giving him of my soul wasn’t what I always dreamed of. Or wasn’t it? There was a time, a time that seemed lifetimes ago, when I wanted that. I felt the surge of love and longing to connect with him from the moment we met. I’d felt like we just fit together. Magnets. It was inexplicable then. How could we have guessed at the enormous truth of us, the reason we’d always felt so drawn to each other? What looked like impetuous and hot-hearted love among teens was so much bigger. It was destiny and purpose.

  We were meant to be together in the most literal and beautiful sense.

  What we were doing was an act of faith. Faith… I didn’t want it to be a dirty word after what Cardinal Báthory had done. But he was just one man, bent crooked by the weight of his own infected heart. Wasn’t it faith that compelled me to do this now, faith that I might play a part in something so important as the reparation of the planet, as the advancement of humanity from the brink of disaster? Faith that my parents would be proud?

  A helicopter crested the hills above the ranch and circled the scene as a news van skidded into the drive. Perfect. Paparazzi witnesses to my own personal apocalypse.

  Finn didn’t want to do this. Not really. It was risky, and we didn’t know if we’d be just ash afterward or would combine into some angelic alien being. But like me, he couldn’t deny we were players in a bigger game. We were meant to do this, even as we worried it wouldn’t work, if it would do nothing more than kill me and feed his Arrazi appetite.

  The expectant eyes of the Arrazi and Scintilla were on us. I looked around me at those faces, especially at the faces of the people I loved. I loved them enough to do this. I just wish I had more time to say good-bye. My eyes found Giovanni holding Claire, and a puff of a cry escaped my lips. His eyes shone with tears, and he nodded, Go.

  There was no time to say good-bye to anyone else. Everyone’s toes were off the cliff. How could we expect them to fulfill their destiny and fly if we weren’t willing to do so first? My faith in the vision didn’t mean I was happy about it. I didn’t want to be a martyr, a prophet, or a savior.

  I was just a girl…

  I wondered how others had felt walking knowingly into death for some version of a greater good. I was no saint. A part of me resented it even, to die for people who would deny me and my sacrifice even after I was gone. I resented it even as I took one tentative step after another toward the boy who’d had my soul in his hands from the moment we met. Would the traces of fear and resentment and grief I felt nullify my sacrifice? Would I die for nothing, like my father, mother, Mari, and countless others? Did intention count?

  If so, then I intended to die so that their lives weren’t lost for nothing.

  Could one girl and one boy join souls and save the world?

  Even across the distance, Finn’s amber eyes lit on me and burned me up from the inside out. If he felt fear, he was hiding it, probably for my benefit. The love in his eyes was the magnet pulling me forward. I could almost pretend it was months ago, it was California, and I was walking with the bloom of love in my chest toward a boy. Just a boy. Not my enemy.

  My wholemate.

  Finn’s foot shuffled forward. Chilean dust billowed like memories. We’d had history on three continents, but it felt bigger than that. I wondered how many lifetimes we’d played this drama out. How many lifetimes had all of us played this drama out?

  “I’m so afraid,” I whispered when we were arm’s length apart.

  “I know, críona. My heart. I am as well.” His eyes glassed over and his lips tilted up in a lopsided smile. “Maybe our fear isn’t real.”

  “Of course it’s real!” I trembled from my core outward. My lips quivered as I spoke. It felt real.

  “Give to me like you’ve done before, luv. I’m here to receive you, to catch you. It’s all I ever wanted—to give love to you and to receive your love.”

  We reached out and grasped hands, each taking a breath as big as the winds over the Andes.

  “You love. I love,” Finn said, radiating the gentleness and peace I’d always felt and seen in him, who he really was. “That’s right here, right now. Fear is just the worry that you’ll lose that love or that you’ll lose something in the future. But right here, right now, all that’s real is love. Let’s be that.”

  Our pulses vibrated and rippled through our bodies. I could feel him, feel his tenderness and the depth of his commitment to do anything for me. Ironically, he could not save me, but together we could save the world. The heart was the stone thrown into the oceans of earth. Love, pure love, rippled outward.

  “Okay,” I said, squeezing his hands and looking into the forever depths of his eyes before taking one last glance at the perfectly messy heavens above us.

  Would the world forget I ever existed, when the wind scattered me to the stars?

  “Your eyes remind me of home,” Finn whispered when I looked back at him, and he placed a soft kiss on my lips. “You are my home.”

  “Okay.” I nodded. I consciously let my heart open and felt my silver pour out toward Finn. “Let there be light.”

  Epilogue

  Bestselling Author and Television Personality, Edmund Nustber

  From the award-winning documentary, The Light Key Conspiracy

  Many journalists dream of reporting from the front lines of war—not to sensationalize warfare but to find meaning in the battle—if there is meaning, as there often is not, and to do it justice. I never dreamed of covering a war, because I don’t believe peace is made with flailing fists. But shortly after meeting Cora Sandoval, I found myself in the middle of a supernatural conflict that’s raged on for thousands of years and which, unbeknownst to the world, threatened our very existence.

  During the climax of the final battle between the Scintilla and the Arrazi, I risked death to chronicle their story and their truth—a truth that had to be seen—felt—for the world to fully comprehend its gravitas. The final moments between these ancient peoples was recorded on video, by me, and now you can see for yourself the cosmic ramifications of their actions.

  It was the most transcendent and awe-inspiring moment of my life.

  These two brave souls, complete opposites of the other in the most essential way, put their fears aside in the midst of battle. Mysticism, faith, and research congealed into a theory that, by willingly joining energies, they could heal the world. Guided by faith in that principle, they walked tentatively toward each other to become the physical representation of “unification of opposites.”

  For many tense moments, it appeared as though nothing was happening. They stood motionless, with their hands clasped, and gazed lovingly upon the other. Soon, to my astonishment, a visible ball of light hovered between them at chest level and undulated like a ghostly specter that grew in size with every breath. Their energy expanded into two spirals of light, which fused together into a third spiral, and then exploded in one loving white mass of light above us as incandescent as the sun.

  The silver-white light arced overhead in what we soon realized was an enormous spiral. Reports later confirmed that this spiral phenomenon was seen hundreds of miles away. Like a great explosion, the energy rippled outward and mushroomed over everyone present and infused our bodies with the most—sorry, I get…emotional…speaking of it. Descriptions are nearly impossible… It was simply the most profound and staggering sensation of love.

  It was love.

  To paraphrase the author, Dylan Thomas, these two raged against the dying of the light.

  Their spiral was the first of many as more brave ones followed suit in the dewy garden of that Chilean ranch. Even those who seemed intent on power, war, and annihilation of their enemies heeded their inner call to be so much greater, to do a much greater thing, and have the power they truly craved.

  It was done for us. To effect massive change in the w
orld. A promise made many lifetimes ago, and finally fulfilled in the hopes that mankind and the earth we inhabit would benefit.

  In the weeks since my first broadcast, these celestial events have happened all over the world from Norway to Mexico and have left Earth, and the people upon her, greatly altered.

  Their gift to humanity.

  I leave you with a quote from Dante Alighieri: “…and those blithe souls flashed out like comets streaming from the sky, Whirling in circles round determined poles. And even as wheels in clock escapement ply, In such fashion geared that motionless, Appears the first one, and the last to fly.”

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  Acknowledgments

  Trilogy is one small word for such an enormous undertaking. Writing this series has been one of the most gratifying challenges of my life. Even now, I wonder if I managed to properly convey what I first envisioned. A writer rarely feels like they’ve truly bagged that beautiful and fluttering bird of an idea.

  To Sydney and Cooper, thank you for believing in me and for your steadfast support during the ups and downs. Only you have been on the front lines with me all the way, and I’m so lucky to have two brilliant and amazing souls by my side.

  Jason, you bring so much light and love into my days. My world is a brighter place because you’re in it. I could not have a better partner in adventure and in life.

  To my Tribe: Lucy, Mary Claire, and Monica (Jo), thank you for always loving me and accepting me for the epic weirdo that I truly am. Our weirds have found a forever home. Your support of my chosen path has meant the world to me.