Gaia Awakened

by Cassie Thorne

  “All right,” I say, grinning. “Maybe you can pay attention. Remember a thing or two.” I climb to my feet and waggle my fingers teasingly. “Autumnus continuare.”

  But everything goes wrong almost immediately. First of all, the spell takes longer to work than it should. And when the portal finally opens, it looks out into the sky above the Autumn Realm.

  When I try to open one at ground level, I can’t.

  My invitation has been restricted.

  What the fuck?

  This has never happened to me before. Ever. I suspected Jasper might have tortured Rowan for the location of The Goddess Codex, but I never thought he’d actually be successful. Before we do anything else, I need to find out what happened to Rowan.

  He’s the last ally we have.

  “You should stay here,” I say to Paige. “My invitation has been restricted, which means Rowan might have been attacked by Jasper.”

  “No.” Her eyes are blazing with fire. “I’m going with you. I want to stop Jasper just as much as you do.”

  “It’ll be dangerous—”

  “I know.” She steps forward to me. “But I’m staying with you, Aidan. Even if it means dealing with Jasper again.”

  The sharp pain in my chest flares up again, even worse than before. It’s bad enough that I’m starting to think I won’t recover from this one. A pattern of ice is crawling over my skin, which can only mean one thing.

  Hellfrost.

  I don’t know how to fucking stop this. At this point it’s painfully clear that the wounds in my back never healed. They’ve only been getting deeper this entire time. I’m freezing from the inside out, not the outside in, and I don’t know how much longer I can remain conscious.

  Paige hasn’t even noticed anything is wrong yet. She’s just turning to look at the portal to the Autumn Realm. Below us is a birch forest where the trees are deep red and bright yellow and warm, vibrant orange. The breeze is whispering with woodwind music and the distant crackling of bonfires. It’ll be the coziest place she’ll have ever seen.

  But my tongue is frozen solid.

  My blood is turning to ice.

  I’m fucking dying.

  As I crumple to my knees, I try to gasp her name. Paige finally turns to look at me and her blue and green eyes widen in horror. At least the last thing I’ll ever see is the most beautiful woman in all of existence.

  “Paige—” I try to say.

  But when I open my mouth, only snow falls out.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Paige

  I stare down at Aidan, trying not to scream. He just told me about Gaia and magically opened a portal to the Autumn Realm, which was insane enough. But just as I was coming to terms with everything, he suddenly choked on snow and collapsed to the floor.

  His lips are still moving.

  He’s trying to speak to me.

  I hastily kneel down and turn Aidan onto his back, trying not to think about how cold his skin feels right now. His green eyes are tinted neon blue, as if he’s wearing colored contact lenses, and a layer of frost is coating his entire body.

  He’s shivering violently.

  “Autumnus... separatum,” Aidan gasps through a mouthful of snow. “If you close the portal... you’ll be safe...”

  He falls silent.

  I check his pulse.

  I can barely feel it.

  No.

  I jolt to my feet in the living room, my hands shaking. This can’t be happening. Just an hour ago, Aidan and I were having sex again and again as red roses magically bloomed around us. I thought Summer had finally come back to me for good. But now he’s being ripped away yet again, and I’m powerless to stop it without magic.

  I hate that we can’t spend more than a few hours together without being attacked. I hate that it feels like Summer is always slipping through my fingers.

  I have the bad feeling he’ll only get colder and colder until he’s dead.

  Aidan told me to close the portal to the Autumn Realm, but I absolutely refuse to watch him die again. It feels insane even just thinking about going into another world by myself, but I don’t think I have any choice. Who cares how dangerous it is? If Rowan is a demigod who researches potions and spells, he can tell me how to unfreeze Aidan.

  He can tell me how to fix everything.

  I whirl around to step through the portal, but that’s when I stumble to a halt. It’s not because the world on the other side looks dangerous. All I can see is a birch forest and a rose-gold sunset dotted by a flock of ravens, accompanied by the strains of medieval music in the distance.

  But I’m in the middle of the sky.

  At least ten stories above the ground.

  The fire in my old apartment never happened. I know that now. I slept in a tower that burned to ashes in the Spring Realm, and I never even lived with Summer on Earth. But I still remember almost everything about my life as Paige, which means I still feel like myself.

  I’m still terrified of heights.

  A paralyzing frost is sweeping through my veins, just like it did on the night of the apartment fire. I’ve forgotten how to move. I was once an all-powerful goddess who knew every spell in existence, but now I can’t seem to remember anything other than the few spells Aidan taught me.

  I’m helpless.

  A voice in the back of my head speaks sharply.

  You aren’t helpless, Paige.

  Think like a human. Not a goddess.

  That’s when Aidan’s body wavers slightly, as if I’ve been staring into a Magic Eye poster. I can see straight through his ribcage and into his heart.

  Three shards of ice are glittering at the very center, exactly where the icicles pierced him earlier.

  This is my fault.

  Aidan is freezing to death because he fought Jasper for me. Because he went into the Winter Realm for me. Every time we’ve been attacked, he’s risked his life to save mine. He turned into a dragon to rescue me from the ice castle, and that was before he knew I used to be Gaia.

  He was willing to die for me.

  I won’t let him.

  A desperate scream emerges from my throat, filled with rage and determination and everything else I’ve felt since meeting Aidan. I don’t want to confront my fear of heights. I don’t want to feel helpless just because I don’t know magic.

  But I’ve been human all my life, and I don’t freaking need magic.

  My own power comes from within me. Not from any spells.

  I’m going to save Summer this time.

  I crouch down beside the portal to find a crude ladder waiting for me. It’s made of vines and branches and looks sturdy enough to support my weight. Maybe if I tell myself I’m only climbing off a bunk bed, I’ll stop feeling like I’m going to throw up.

  Maybe.

  “Don’t leave me, okay?” I whisper to Aidan.

  And then, with my heart in my throat, I start to climb down.

  It takes me forever to descend into the Autumn Realm. Especially because it takes me a while to work up the nerve to climb more than a few rungs at a time. The vines and branches keep swaying back and forth in the wind, and I think I can hear amused laughter below me. But I force myself to keep going, even when I want desperately to stop.

  I don’t look at the ground, ever.

  I don’t release the vines, ever.

  I don’t slow down, ever.

  And that’s how I make it all the way down to the ground.

  When I reach the bottom of the ladder, I pry my fingers loose and step down into a clearing of fallen leaves. I have no idea how I haven’t thrown up yet, but at least I’m still alive. The leaves drifting down around me are a mixture of beautiful autumn colors, and this feels like the kind of place where I could settle down underneath a tree and lose myself in a book forever.

  I’m not home anymore. But at least I know I’m somewhere safe.

  A snort startles me. I look up to see a stag with large antlers observing my appearance. It’s as tall
as I am, with intelligent eyes and well-groomed fur. The creature doesn’t seem to be dangerous or anything, but there’s something unsettling about it. If the demigods can transform into dragons, maybe they can transform into other animals as well.

  The stag could even be Rowan himself.

  “Are you the ruler of this realm?” I ask the creature, trying not to feel stupid.

  Its large, mournful eyes stare back at me without response. I don’t know what I was expecting. If the stag was a demigod, it probably would have turned back into a human by now.

  “Can you take me to Rowan?” I try instead.

  A slow blink.

  “I really need his help. My name is Paige—”

  The stag seems to jolt to attention at my name. After a few seconds, it bends its forelegs and bows deeply to me, like the lions at the zoo.

  I stare down at the stag in surprise. Is this happening because I’m Gaia? Do I have the power to make animals kneel before me?

  “That will be enough,” says a calm voice.

  A sturdy man with bronzed skin walks out from behind a birch tree. Leafy antlers are protruding from his copper brown hair, and his eyes are amber yellow and deeply piercing, like an owl’s. He’s shirtless and moves with the casual grace of a wild animal, but I instinctively know he could race with the speed of the wind if he wanted.

  The stag was bowing to him. Not me.

  “Are you Rowan?” I ask, feeling self-conscious.

  “Yes.” His eyes are considering me neutrally. “And you must be Paige. Or is it Gaia?”

  I have the uncomfortable feeling he can see into me, the same way I could see into Aidan’s heart, but far more clearly. “I’m Paige, but I think I used to be Gaia.”

  He gives a slow nod. “Something has happened to Aidan. I restricted his invitation the moment I sensed it.”

  “Jasper’s icicles froze him,” I start. “We really need your help—”

  “I cannot cross into the Earth Realm during this time,” Rowan says calmly. “It is not my season in either of the hemispheres.”

  “What?” I try to remember what Aidan told me about the demigods. “But I don’t need you to come with me. If you tell me how to unfreeze him, I can save him myself...”

  I trail off. Rowan doesn’t even seem concerned. He’s just watching me with detached amusement, as if I’m an actress in a play that won’t have any consequences in real life.

  “I possess a spellbook that I believe will help you,” he says. “Please come with me.”

  A sudden rush of wind laced with spice and smoke engulfs our bodies. I instinctively step forward, my eyes and throat burning in the smoke, to find that we’ve been magically transported into an outdoor library intertwined with nature. Somehow I recognize this place, even though I’ve never seen it before.

  Rowan’s woodland archive.

  Bookcases built from twigs and peat function as walls, while stately maple trees shelter and protect the library with leaves made of wildwind. The ground is carpeted with illustrated tapestries that shift and move when I gaze at them for more than a few seconds. Above us, hawks are swooping back and forth with books gripped in their talons. I can practically feel the weight of ancient lore and magic against my skin.

  This might actually be better than the Dragon’s Tale.

  “Follow me.” Rowan turns and begins to tread deeper into the library. His movements are so quiet and graceful I can barely hear him walking.

  “How many books are in your collection?” I ask, hurrying to catch up to him. My own feet crunch loudly over dry leaves as I try not to step on the small woodland animals darting past us. “The Great Library of Alexandria owned four hundred thousand titles, but you must have at least a million—”

  “Millions,” he says curtly. “I possess the very scrolls from the Great Library and more. It would exceed anything your mind could comprehend in its human state.”

  Despite our mutual love of books, I’m starting to get the vibe that everything this guy says is meant as an insult.

  I don’t think I like it.

  Rowan eventually halts beside a long wooden table covered in books. Enough chairs are arranged around the table for a large meeting, but the only other person present is a naked girl with elf ears. She’s kneeling beside a fireplace, stirring the contents of a cauldron with a ladle.

  “This is what you seek,” Rowan says, bending his antlered head to me.

  I glance down to see a large book on the table. It’s ancient yet preserved with expertise, and the leather cover is gilded with metal filaments as well as four types of gemstones: emeralds, sapphires, rose quartz, and tiger’s eyes.

  At the very center is the shape of an eye inset with a diamond.

  Below it is the title of the book.

  The Goddess Codex.

  Holy shit.

  It’s real.

  “Where did you find this?” I ask, not knowing whether to be terrified or relieved. But despite all my research to the contrary, I think I’ve always known the book was real. I just never thought I’d see it, much less in the company of an antlered demigod.

  “Gaia entrusted me with her spellbook before she slept for millennia.” Rowan’s lips curl into a slight smirk. “She also requested that I find an alternative to her glass casket, which I located in the form of a reincarnation spell: Memoria novare. Orbis amare. Allowing Aidan to waste his time searching for The Goddess Codex was necessary, however unfortunate. Subtlety is not his strong suit, and I could not be certain of Gaia’s new identity once she was awake. My only path was to send Aidan to humans with magic who might be you.”

  With a wave of his hand, Rowan opens the spellbook to a recipe. The page contains numbered instructions and a list of ingredients: red wine, clementines, cloves, ambrosia, and the blood of an ice god.

  At the very top is a cursive title in my own handwriting.

  Thawing Potion.

  “To thaw Aidan’s heart, you must brew this recipe. I can provide most of the ingredients, including ambrosia.” Rowan gestures at the cauldron, which contains a bubbling golden liquid. “But the blood of an ice god may only be obtained from Jasper himself, and willingly. You must bargain with him for it.”

  I remember the pale demigod and instinctively shiver, even though I’m not cold. “Isn’t there a spell that can unfreeze Aidan? He’s been teaching me how to speak magic—”

  “No. A spell to undo harm to the mind. A potion to undo harm to the body.”

  “But can’t you deal with Jasper for me or something?” My voice falters as the elven girl glances at me and shakes her head subtly. “I mean, I can’t go back to the Winter Realm. Not without Gaia’s binding spell.”

  “I must remain impartial,” he says. “Gaia kept her binding spells secret from us, or else I would have attempted to speak one long ago. My only desire now is to restore the balance between the realms. If I deal with Jasper on your behalf, I will become his enemy. And I do not wish to fight in his war again.”

  As I gaze at the ruler of the Autumn Realm, his body seems to shimmer and I can see right into him. His insides are scarred with layers of ancient pain that must have formed an unimaginably long time ago. From what I can see, Rowan has fought pure hellfrost over and over again, at a terrible cost to himself, in an attempt to ease the suffering of the creatures in his realm.

  “You don’t understand,” I say slowly. “If I go to Jasper, he’ll kill me—”

  “As he has killed many others! As I have killed even more.”

  A wave of rage and wildwind rolls off Rowan’s mind. It’s enough to make me flinch away from him, gasping for air, my fingers curling into involuntary fists. My mind is being flooded with memories from his past, memories that are terrifying in ways I can’t even begin to understand.

  Blood covering his hands.

  Blood staining his jagged teeth and tongue.

  Blood dripping onto his tanned chest as he yanks out organs and intestines from humans as retaliation for killing
his animals.

  He won’t hesitate to kill me too.

  The only reason he hasn’t is because I used to be Gaia.

  “Why should I trust you?” I ask angrily. I touch my face in surprise to find that I’m shedding tears for all the people he’s killed. “For all I know, Jasper asked you to send me to him.”

  “Do you truly believe I would deal with that heretic?” Rowan spits out. “I have spent centuries forcing my invitation open again.” He savagely tears out the recipe and offers the page to me. “This is the only way to thaw Aidan’s heart. Are you willing to take it or not?”

  I instinctively know Rowan is telling me the truth. But I’ve never been the kind of person to risk my life or sacrifice myself for someone else. Even when Summer was trying to save me from the fire, I couldn’t make myself leave through the window on my own. I almost couldn’t even climb into the Autumn Realm just now. So am I seriously going to face a demigod who wields the literal power of winter and death?

  But ever since I met Aidan, it’s as if something has awakened inside me. I can feel an incredible amount of power simmering inside my blood even now. There’s a fire burning passionately in my heart, and I know beyond a doubt that I have loved Aidan for longer than I can fathom. Even if our names are different, even if neither of us fully remembers what happened before, we’ve somehow found each other and fallen in love all over again.

  I think Gaia allowed herself to be reborn for Aidan’s sake. While she was sleeping, he was struggling to control his power. Struggling with the urge to become a dragon. Struggling with the loneliness of war.

  Gaia would have done anything to save the man she loved.

  As will I.

  After a few seconds, I accept the recipe with steady hands. “I have to bargain with Jasper before Aidan freezes to death. Can you send me to the Winter Realm?”

  Rowan narrows his amber yellow eyes, but then his muscles relax and the torrent of wildwind and rage seeps out of the air around us. He crooks a finger at the elven girl, who rushes over with a heavy winter cloak. As she drapes it around my shoulders and fastens a metal clasp at my throat, I can feel a shield of magical protection envelop me.