Life Beyond the Temple

by Nikolai Joslin

  It is strong, powerful, sharp as daggers.

  It erodes the world around it.

  The wind does not change for the world. The world changes for the wind.

  I could feel the wind get sharper when it ran across my skin, occasionally leaving thin lines of blood. I could barely feel it, though; I was caught up in the magic.

  I took a deep breath and pushed it away from me and at Martun and Jaysun, feeling it steadily sharpen to a point. Like needles whipping through the air.

  Jaysun and Martun were half caught by surprise, and while Jaysun was able to put a stone barrier up in time, Martun was buffeted by the wind. Wind doesn’t automatically cut through an obstacle, but it wears it down, and that’s basically what it did to Martun. It tore through his clothes, biting into his flesh, cutting through his arms and legs. Even Jaysun’s wall didn’t stand much of a chance. It was slowly being eaten away and turned to dust before us.

  I raised my hands high above my head and brought them down quickly, and rain was pulled into the wind storm I had created.

  Martun howled as the first drops touched his skin, and he covered his head with the scraps that were left of his jacket. The stone wall was coming down faster now; holes were coming through it completely.

  “What the hell did you do?” Martun screamed at me as he looked at his bloodied hands that were a mixture of deep cuts and burns.

  “Acid rain,” I replied calmly.

  I couldn’t keep it up forever, though; it was taking its toll on me. I had extra power, yes, but I had used a lot of it up by now, and while it regenerated rather quickly, I didn’t have the time to wait.

  It slowed to a stop, and Jaysun’s wall lowered back into the floor. He had cuts and a few burns on him, but he wasn’t like Martun. Martun looked like a bloody piece of meat. He limped forward, his hand held out, but he couldn’t do anything. “What happened?” he shouted at me. “What did you do to me?”

  “The wind targeted main Life Force pathways. The acid rain was meant to wash over your entire body, but the wind was meant to stop you from doing anything.”

  “Damn you!” he screamed, his voice cracking. “Damn you.”

  “Shut up!” Jaysun shouted. “You useless creature!” He stuck his hand out and a ball of green flame engulfed Martun.

  He screamed for moments before he crumpled to the ground silently.

  “Brilliant, isn’t it?” he asked, watching his green flames with pride.

  “What is it?”

  “I created it. I’m sure you guessed that, though. It’s just fire. Well, more potent fire.” He reached his hand out again. “There’s only one thing that can put it out.” A stream of red fire shot out from his palm and the green fire dissipated. “Fire. Interesting, isn’t it? Fighting fire with fire.”

  “Nobody would ever think of it,” I agreed, ready to get back to the fight.

  Martun was dead.

  Gone.

  Killed by his ally.

  Focus, I told myself.

  I didn’t have much Life Force left, so I would need to finish this off quickly.

  I was still wrapped up in my thoughts when I heard someone shout my name; I barely registered it as Regan’s voice.

  I began to turn toward her, but she tackled me to the floor.

  She held herself above me, but her arms shook and her face contorted in pain. “You should pay more attention.” She gasped and rolled off of me. Two jagged metal shards about as long as my forearm protruded from her side. “I love you. The Old Ones said I’d know what to do when my time came, and they were right. Now go save the world.” She smiled weakly and let her head fall back. Her breathing was ragged, but she was breathing, which meant I could save her.

  I crawled closer, but just before I could touch her a bolt of electricity flew past me, nearly hitting me. “No! Pay attention to me! We are in the middle of something!” Jaysun shouted, reminding me of a young child I had seen in the city who screamed at his mother for candy.

  I raised a stone wall to try and keep Regan and me safe, at least for a moment.

  “Regan, I’m going to save you.” Tears were falling now.

  She smiled a little more and closed her eyes. “Protecting you was my first and only job. I would never let anything hurt you if I could stop it. Focus on him. You have to focus on him.” Her voice was so quiet, and it was often stopping so that she could take in her shallow breaths.

  Where were Cam and Ston?

  Why weren’t they here yet?

  I moved around the corner of my stone wall and reached out at Jaysun. He smiled his damned twisted smile at me.

  I felt for his Life Force, for his essence. I could feel his pulse, the rushing of blood, Life Force moving through him. I could feel it all.

  “The body is mostly water,” I whispered, focusing on his blood. “Water, when it gets agitated, heats up. The molecules bounce around faster and faster. They rub against each other and get out. That’s how it boils,” I said, explaining to him what every Temple kid is told when they study water. “It makes steam if it gets hot enough.”

  He looked down at his body, which was turning a pinkish red now. “What are you doing?”

  “Agitating water molecules,” I whispered. “I don’t want to. But I need to. Regan needs me, and I don’t have time to waste on you. I don’t have time to find a better way to do this.”

  “Stop!” he screamed.

  I couldn’t blame him. I had created this spell years ago. It had been thought up by others before, but never put into action, not to mention the focus it took to agitate molecules in a target so large and far away. Boiling water inside of a living thing. It must have been torture. But he deserved torture.

  “I can’t,” I whispered. “Someone always needs to die. It needs to be you. I can’t let her die. I need her. I need Regan. I can’t let her die.” A hot tear fell from my chin and splashed on the floor.

  He fell to his knees, screaming, and then fell forward, not moving any longer. I didn’t stop for another minute or so, though, just to be sure.

  I needed to be sure he was gone.

  I raced over to Regan, put my hand on her chest, and said things I would never remember.

  The door burst open, and someone started to say something but stopped.

  I couldn’t feel her Life Force. I couldn’t hear her heartbeat. I didn’t feel any blood rushing through those veins. Nothing.

  I’m sorry, Cinder whispered. I was supposed to protect her, but she… she ran around me when I was paying attention to you, and I couldn’t stop her. She was already next to you before I knew what happened. I’m so sorry. It’s my fault. It’s all my fault. He whined outwardly and lay down, putting his head under his paws.

  It’s not your fault. I didn’t… I didn’t stop Jaysun. I didn’t know he was going to hurt her. I didn’t see it.

  Cam was the first one who walked up. She stood next to me. I was on my knees, sobbing into Regan’s chest with fistfuls of her shirt in my hands.

  She didn’t say anything. She just stood there.

  And then she knelt down beside Regan and said, “Sit up, Casey. We have work to do.” She grabbed Regan’s wrist and shoulder.

  “What-what do you mean?” I asked through my sobs.

  “She said you brought someone back before. If there was ever someone who deserved to be here instead of there, it’s Regan. Now get up, and let’s do this.”

  “Someone died last time, Cam. It’s not worth it. It won’t work. If we do this, they’ll kill us both, and the Old Ones won’t bring her back. There’s no way that she can come back. They needed me last time I did this. That’s the only reason I’m alive. It won’t work, Cam!” I shouted when she didn’t seem to understand.

  “Either you help me, or I do this on my own. Remember when I said I’d rather feel daggers when you look at her than see you unhappy? You’re unhappy, Casey. I’m not sitting back and watching that! You can help me, or I’ll do this on my own!” She looked back at Reg
an, and a tear slipped from the corner of her eye and fell onto Regan’s arm.

  There was no stopping Cam. She had already decided what she wanted, and I couldn’t do anything about it.

  Except maybe keep her alive.

  Maybe I could do what I couldn’t before and have them take me instead of her.

  “Alright,” I whispered. “I’ll help you.”

  I moved to Regan’s other side and touched her forehead.

  I’ll see you on the other side, baby. I thought, partly to myself, partly to Regan. I hoped she could hear me from here.

  I grabbed her shoulder and left my other hand on her forehead.

  I closed my eyes and said, “On three, we pour Life Force into her.”

  “Okay,” Cam said. She sounded nervous.

  “One. Two.” I took a deep breath and said, “Three.”

  ANOTHER BRIGHT, white room. I looked up, expecting the old man with the white beard, but I was alone.

  “No!” I screamed. “No! Take me! Take me instead! Leave Cam!” I could feel myself crying again. “Leave Cam. It’s my fault! She did this all for me! She’s innocent! She doesn’t understand!” I dropped my head between my knees and whispered, “Take me. She’s innocent. Put her back where she belongs. It’s not her time. She’s supposed to live. Please.”

  “CAMERON. CAMERON, wake up. We have something to discuss. You shouldn’t have done what you just did.”

  I groaned and opened my eyes slowly. I felt like I was going to throw up.

  The light made me wince. “Damn, turn the lights down, you guys,” I grumbled and looked around.

  An old man was standing in the middle of the room. He had transparent blue eyes and a long white beard. He wore a white robe and no shoes. “Hello, Cam.”

  “You must be one of those Old Ones guys.”

  He smiled faintly. “I am. I am the one who usually communicates with the living.”

  “Does that mean Casey’s alone?” He nodded. “Good. She’ll try and convince people to let me live.” I smiled a little and let my head fall back against the wall. “I knew that’s why she helped me.”

  “You can’t bring people back to life, Cameron.”

  “I had to try.”

  “It is the most basic law in our worlds. The dead cannot come back to the world of the living. It is not where they belong.”

  “She shouldn’t have died.”

  “No, she was not supposed to die yet, but she has died. She now belongs to the Veil.”

  “You have to bring her back.”

  “I cannot. I cannot keep Casey alive either. We had made a deal years ago. She would not try this again, and she could live, yet here she is. She has once again tried to bring back someone who has passed. She cannot return to the living world again. Neither of them can. The others are talking about if we should punish you and return you to your world.”

  I closed my eyes. “Putting me back there without Casey is the worst punishment you could give me, sir. I can’t imagine a world without Casey. That’s why I tried to bring Regan back for her. She needs Regan. I would do anything for her.”

  “Why do this for the woman you love? You had a chance to be with her, but you were willing to give it up. Why?” He seemed so curious, but it was the only thing that made sense to me.

  “Have you ever been in love?” He didn’t say anything. “I guess not. I can’t explain it. It’s… it’s like your body is on fire when you see them, but it doesn’t burn. Well,” I chuckled, “most of the time it doesn’t. Every nerve ending lights up, and you can feel everything, your eyes see clearer, you smell better, you can hear the flap of a butterfly’s wing, and everything else is just more because of that one person. I would give anything to make Casey happy. Anything in the world. She loves Regan, and so I was going to give her Regan.”

  “You would die.”

  “I don’t mind death so much. Seems peaceful. Seems right. Dying for someone else.”

  “For Regan?”

  “No. For Casey. For Casey’s happiness. I don’t like the idea of never being alive again. It’s not that I want to die. It’s that Casey would never be the same without Regan.”

  “The dead cannot come back to the living, Cameron.”

  I nodded. This had all been for nothing. Nothing. “Don’t kill Casey. Leave her be. I’ll take her spot. A trade.”

  “I cannot do that.”

  “I’m nothing out there, sir. Casey changes the world every second she lives, but I don’t. She’s smart, powerful, caring, and wants to help everyone. Someone like that can make more than one difference in the world. Her time isn’t now. Don’t waste someone so good for this world before you need to. I won’t do anything. I will always just… be there. I’ll forever be taking up space for no reason. Casey is who you need in that world. Take me, leave her. I understand Regan can’t go back. No matter how much I want her back, she’s gone. But Casey is here, in another one of these rooms, isn’t she? She isn’t dead yet. She’s in a sort of limbo. You don’t need to bring her back to the living, just keep her in the living. Please, sir. Don’t make me go back there.”

  He looked at me for a long time. “You understand what you’re asking?”

  I nodded. “Yes, sir. Even if you can’t bring Regan back, don’t take Casey from her world. Take me.”

  He nodded. “If that is what you desire, I can do that.”

  I closed my eyes and let out a sigh of relief. “Does it hurt?”

  “It has already been done.”

  I felt a tear slip from my eyes. “Thank you.”

  I heard him whisper, “I was once in love too, young one.”

  Chapter 27

  “NOW, CASEY Kelley, tell us about your Proving Journey.”

  I felt empty.

  Numb.

  I couldn’t even think right.

  But I told them about it. I told them everything, from meeting Ston, to finding my spirit animal, to Cam stealing my wallet, saving the elves, finding out Martun was a traitor, and killing Jaysun.

  “And your knight, where is she?”

  I felt my heart stick in my throat. I couldn’t speak. I just wanted to cry.

  “Dead,” I whispered. “She died protecting me from the necromancer.”

  My grandfather nodded. “And the cinderwolf?”

  “Is my spirit animal,” I whispered.

  He nodded. “I can honestly say that I have never heard of a Proving such as this, but seeing as a city is destroyed back on the mainland, humans are less aggressive toward us, and there are elven knights roaming the Temple now, I find it hard not to believe you. You have passed. You may return to your old room, pick up what you need, and be on your way into your new life.” He walked up to me and pulled me into a hug. He had never hugged me before. I tentatively hugged him back. “Good-bye, Casey. I will miss you, as will many of us.”

  “Good-bye, Grandfather.”

  “Enjoy your new life and good luck.” He patted my back and stepped away.

  “Thank you,” I whispered and turned away.

  Cinder followed me.

  Is it over?

  I nodded.

  Liam and Ston are waiting at the ferry.

  I just want to stop by my room for a minute.

  We walked in silence the rest of the way.

  The door was left ajar, as if Martun and I had just left.

  The room was bare except for two twin-sized beds and two desks pushed up against the walls. I stood in front of my old bed, the pit in my stomach growing heavier. I could barely remember sleeping alone. I didn’t sleep at all last night. I couldn’t. I had watched the two people I cared about die. Who could sleep after that? I felt wrong. And cold. Like everything in me had turned to ice and nothing I did would make me warm again.

  I felt empty. I felt more alone in this moment than I ever had been.

  I checked under my bed and pulled out a notebook. It was filled with meaningless work. I realized all the problems in it now.

 
This all felt like it had been a lifetime ago, but it hadn’t even been a year. Everything had changed so much. I didn’t even know how it all happened. I couldn’t remember most of my life here.

  I could remember the day I walked into the library to see Regan sitting in my chair like it was yesterday, though.

  I looked away and shut the notebook.

  I spun the ring on my finger absentmindedly and walked over to my desk.

  I had worked here late into the nights most days. I had so many of those Life Force amplifiers around that it was crazy. I was always making them for people. For Martun. He always seemed to be losing them.

  Martun. I didn’t realize how he felt. I never noticed. I had been so wrapped up in myself that I didn’t see what he was going through. It was horrible. I was his best friend, and I never even noticed.

  His jacket was hung over the back of a chair, waiting to get washed.

  I was wearing mine now. It had been cold outside. I didn’t take Regan’s jacket. I thought it belonged to her. It didn’t seem right to take it.

  Mine had holes in it still from burns and cuts.

  I reached up to touch the scar on my arm from where I had been hit in our battle.

  I didn’t even heal it; Ston had to do it for me. I was too busy sobbing.

  “We should go,” I whispered hoarsely.

  Cinder followed me out of the Temple and back down to the ferry.

  Liam and Ston were talking to each other. The dark elf was a few inches taller than Liam, and his dark purple skin contrasted Liam’s. They stood out like sore thumbs.

  Liam was going to be staying in the human cities for a while. He wanted to learn more about them and start reaching out to them. He wanted to build a relationship between the dark elves, humans, and mages.

  Considering how close he was to Ston, I thought he was doing pretty well with at least one dark elf. Well enough to stay in bed together at least. But I didn’t tell them I knew. That was their business.

  I heard Ston’s deep laugh as I walked up.

  Liam grinned at me. “Ready to get out of here? You’ve been waiting your entire life for a normal life, and now you can finally have it.”