Crystal Caged (Air Awakens: Vortex Chronicles Book 5)

by Elise Kova

  He looked at her with that same wary gaze. Vi couldn’t recall if she’d ever seen it from him before. He finally stopped, his back to her.

  “I know that we’ve committed to this being it, the final time,” he said delicately.

  “Yes, in me is now the essence of Yargen that was in the Crystal Caverns and three crystal weapons. All that remains is to collect the remaining essence from the ashes, and the final crystal weapon in you.”

  His back straightened. Taavin was taut and stiff as he slowly turned to face her. Hurt shone in his eyes.

  Had she said something wrong?

  He’d already known this truth.

  “I know,” Taavin said softly. “But Victor has a trace of Raspian’s power… would it not be better to see him ended? In case Raspian’s essence was inadvertently split, as Yargen’s was?”

  Vi thought about this a moment and then shook her head. “No, if he had the actual essence of Raspian, he’d be dead. His body is not made for such things. He has a fracture of the dark god’s magic… much like a crystal shaving. It’s a bit of magic, but not the essence itself.”

  “Better to be safe?”

  “I’m confident.” Vi swung her feet over the side of the bed.

  “I know,” Taavin said hastily, crossing over to her. “I know we’ve already given up on ensuring the birth of a new Champion. But lingering here for a few more weeks—that’s all—and giving the watch to Vhalla couldn’t hurt, could it?”

  “Why do you seek to delay the inevitable?” Vi was reminded that even though she’d blessed him with an immortal body, he still very much had a mortal mind.

  “A little bit of assurance that somehow, maybe, if this doesn’t work… there’s hope.”

  “I am the hope of this world.”

  Taavin knelt before her. “Then, if not for the world, what about to ensure there is a new Vi born? Not for the world but for… somehow, for us. A new Taavin will be born, and then—”

  “I don’t care about the birth of a new Vi.” He recoiled as though she’d slapped him. But Vi had spoken plainly, calmly, and without emotion.

  “Vi, stop this,” he whispered. Taavin shook his head and brought his shining green eyes back to hers. “If not for you, or me, or us, then for Vhalla. She lost her magic in the Caverns. If you don’t return the watch to her, she’ll have no chance of getting it back once more. Victor will surely kill her.”

  “Vhalla’s death matters not to me.”

  “How can you say that?” He blinked up at her. “A day ago you were seeking to save her and the world.”

  “Those were sentimentalities of a narrow mind.”

  “What are you saying?” Taavin stood and, instead of pulling away, leaned forward and wrapped his arms tightly around her. Vi stiffened under his touch. Something in her was fighting to escape. A war for her heart and mind threatened to tear her apart. “This isn’t you,” he whispered in her ear. “Sentimentality, love—these aren’t narrow-minded. These are the greatest gifts we have in this world. The only things that make this world worth saving.”

  Vi felt a snap inside her, and she could move again. Her hands were her own. Warmth flooded her and Vi reached for the man it poured from. She wanted to drown in it, in him.

  Tightening her arms around him, pulling him onto the bed with her, Vi whispered, “All right.”

  “Yes?”

  “We’ll give the watch to Vhalla. But not for anyone to be born and not even for her magic.” She managed to say the words before that cool and detached feeling overtook her once more.

  “For what, then?” he whispered.

  Vi pulled away, just enough to look him in the eye. “For you, Taavin. For a few more stolen moments with you.”

  Victor’s influence spread. With even a sliver of Raspian’s power at his disposal, the man wrought turmoil across the continent. It seemed to follow behind them as Vi and Taavin made their way to the Crossroads one final time.

  But they made it without issue, and Vi had never been more relieved to see their quiet shop and second-floor abode still standing, waiting for them.

  “I was half worried it wouldn’t be here,” she said as she dismounted in the back alley and tied their horse to a post.

  “The West always holds out against Victor. At least for a while.”

  “Just like they held out against the Empire. It’s a stubborn land.”

  “Ah, so stubbornness is in your blood.”

  “What little blood I have left.”

  “Don’t speak like that, please,” he said as he followed her inside.

  “I’m sorry.” Vi drifted up the stairs, setting her pack and saddlebags down heavily.

  Two arms closed tightly around her. They stood in the center of the room, Taavin at her back, clutching her tightly. He buried his face into her shoulder, kissing her neck lightly.

  “Don’t be sorry,” he whispered. “Just be with me.”

  “Because you’ll be gone soon,” she breathed. His grip tightened further but he didn’t say anything. The silence was unbearable. “I know I’ve chosen this. But I’m not ready, Taavin. I’m not ready to lose you.”

  “You never will be.”

  She twisted, keeping his arms around her. Vi grabbed his face with both her hands, smoothing her fingertips up the cheekbones and browline that she knew so well she could carve it from memory. “If I let you go now, I’ll be alone,” she barely managed to say around the lump in her throat. She closed her eyes, keeping the distinct prickle of tears safely behind her lids. “I can’t do this alone.”

  Taavin leaned forward, kissing her gently. It was another postponement of the inevitable, but Vi gave into it. The less she had to think about what the next days would hold, the better. For all she knew, this was the last time she could lose herself in the weight of Taavin’s body over hers.

  He took a step, forcing her to take one backwards. They shuffled to the bed. Taavin’s hands slid up her sides, pulling the loose tunic she wore with them. Vi raised her arms over her head, allowing him to undress her.

  Her back on the bed, Vi beckoned him atop her. She trailed her fingers down the expanse of his skin and then back up to his face. The man was magic—magic in his bones, magic in the way he moved. This was what she wanted to give herself to, forever. Every shift of their bodies was fire and life, the last brilliant burst before their own flames would be extinguished.

  If they were meant to burn, then they burned together.

  “In another world,” he breathed heavily, pressing his forehead against hers. “I would’ve married you.”

  Vi laughed, then responded, equally breathy, “The crown princess of Solaris and the Voice of Yargen… Do you think it would’ve worked?”

  “Of course.” He nipped at her earlobe and then kissed down her neck to her collarbone. “It would’ve united two continents. Our union would’ve shocked and changed the world.”

  Fantasizing about such a thing was pain and delight in equal measure. Vi closed her eyes and imagined it as his fingers laced with hers. She imagined she made love to a husband. She imagined their union was one the world could know about—that their lives were their own.

  The daydreams continued as he lay next to her, Vi’s head on his chest. She traced the lines of his muscles, drawing different ways to connect them as though they were glyphs yet to be discovered. Taavin kissed her forehead from time to time. His own fingers moved lazily on her bare back.

  Dawn had come and she was ready to spend the day with him. She was ready to have eternity with him, but all they had was a few short hours before nightfall. As the day continued its relentless march, Vi finally pulled herself from the bed. She sat with her back to Taavin, the watch heavy around her throat.

  “It’s time. I feel it.” Just as she’d felt it the last time Vhalla had come to the curiosity shop.

  Taavin stood, moving before her. He hadn’t bothered dressing; Vi savored every inch of his glorious frame.

  “I’ll be the one to r
eturn my consciousness.” He held out his hand. “All you need to do is give me the watch.”

  Vi lifted her hands to her neck, slowly unfastening the clasp. The token was heavy with the weight of destiny. She held it over his waiting palm, her hand trembling.

  In the end, he didn’t make her do anything. Taavin closed his fingers around the watch, taking it gently from her. Vi looked up at him, silently begging him not to do this.

  There was no other choice. This was the end for them. She’d known it was coming all along, and yet she still spent every minute breaking inside.

  “If you succeed and the world isn’t rebuilt again. If you somehow make it on the other side alive… See this watch still finds its way to the next Taavin.” His emerald eyes met hers. “Give him his memories.” Taavin cupped her cheek, his fingers in her hair at the nape of her neck. “Let all of me return to you, Vi.”

  “I will,” she lied—the most beautiful lie of her life. She’d seen Yargen’s vision. Time for time. The goddess would have her body and return to this world. Taavin’s collective memories, everything that made him Taavin, would be locked in a watch, and Vi would be lost forever as a castaway from a bygone world. “I love you, Taavin.”

  “And I love you, Vi Solaris. I always have, and I always will. My life was never complete until the moment you returned to it. You gave me meaning. You gave me my past and my future.” He bent over and claimed her mouth hungrily. She grabbed his shoulders, digging her fingertips into his soft skin. When he pulled away, Vi let out a soft whimper, one he ignored. “It’s time.”

  She stood, watching as he stepped back. Taavin held the watch, his lips murmuring fast and low. The only words she could make out were “Narro hath loreth,” to imprint a communication mark.

  There were a thousand words she wanted to say. A thousand more times she wanted to tell him she loved him. She was the ninety-third Vi to let him go, but this time hurt more than any of the others. She didn’t need to look into the past to know that.

  She had held him, loved him, in an impossible time and place. The light of Taavin’s glyphs began to consume him. They covered his entire form. His eyes opened and, one last time, they met hers.

  Then, his gaze became unfocused. His pupils dilated. He fell to the ground, the watch clattering across the floor.

  Vi dragged herself over to him. The world spun as she knelt over the body he had occupied. She touched his arm, trailed her fingers to his shoulder, gently rocking him.

  “Taavin,” she whispered, staring at his wide, soulless eyes. “Taavin.” Vi choked on his name and doubled over.

  She sobbed.

  Tears flowed freely, her shoulders shaking. She gasped for air. The only pain she’d ever known that came close to this was the knowledge that her world was gone. That everyone she’d loved had been undone with a goddess’s broad stroke.

  But this.

  This.

  He was gone, and she would never see him again. This was the end of their love story. This was the last moment she had with him and she hadn’t found the words to tell him how much he meant to her. She had decades with him and had never found those perfect words to encapsulate it all. She needed at least another hundred years and then some.

  “Taavin, please.” A high-pitched wail escaped her. She didn’t care if half the Crossroads heard it. Let the world hear her agony. “Please don’t go,” Vi begged futilely. “Don’t take your warmth, your love—it was all I had left.” The begging was catharsis. She pleaded with the cruel gods whose game she was trapped in. And yet, without those same gods, she would’ve never met him worlds ago.

  Vi buried her face into his shoulder, weeping until the tears no longer came. She expelled the last of her humanity, the last of her feeling, through her eyes. This was their curse, after all.

  They had never been made for happy endings.

  Finally, when the sun hung low in the sky, Vi peeled herself away from him. With one hand on his shoulder, she whispered, “Juth mariy. Come undone.”

  His skin began to glow. Pure light peeled off his body like ashes cast from an invisible fire. The magic she had made that held him together unraveled all too easily. Beneath it all was the crystal she had taken from the Caverns. It was the essence of Yargen that had lived in the Sword of Jadar, the Caverns, and the scythe.

  She allowed that power to flow into her, as if she could steal some of the last of his essence. After getting a taste of it, Vi couldn’t help absorbing it hungrily. It dulled some senses and heightened others. Yargen’s power was a balm to her pain and she invited it into her.

  All she was missing was the Flame of Yargen.

  She was nearly complete.

  Blinking, Vi saw the world with new eyes. Everything seemed to have a vibration to it, a faint outline of magic that she had never seen before. In everything was both light and darkness, woven together and held in perfect balance. She looked down at her hands and saw the power of Yargen shining over top them. Tiny glyphs of words she was certain she would’ve never understood before had meaning.

  The language of the gods was becoming known to her. With two of the three parts of Yargen within her, there was no Lightspinning she couldn’t do.

  Taavin’s body had been reduced to obsidian dust. There wasn’t even a lock of his hair for her to keep as a memento. Vi reached for the pocket watch. It was all she had left of him, and now she had to give it away.

  She dressed slowly in the same robes she wore the last time she met Vhalla in this place. It no longer felt like a costume she donned to play at fate.

  Downstairs, Vi destroyed the few remaining objects on the shop’s shelves with juth. It was an empty catharsis, and did little to make her feel better. Finally, she pulled back the curtain and lit a single candle.

  Memories danced like shadow puppets in the flame of ninety-two other moments when a Vi had stood ready to perform this task. Each was a vision she shouldn’t have. Each carried an instruction for what must be done, but Vi didn’t want to expend the effort to understand what was being asked of her.

  She didn’t want to think—Mother above, she barely wanted to breathe. Everything was too confusing and wholly too much. Taavin was gone, there was little reason left for Vi to remain in the world as she was. Her time was up. She was ready to submit to Yargen.

  “I don’t want to do this,” Vi whispered into the darkness. Her hand was still clutched around the watch. It had been Taavin’s final wish to see it given to Vhalla to ensure the birth of a new Champion. She wanted to honor that, but… “I don’t have the strength to give him away.”

  Then don’t, a voice whispered from within. Let me. I know what must be done, and you have given me enough strength to do it.

  Yargen’s words were as clear as her presence. Vi could imagine the goddess standing behind her, hands on Vi’s shoulders, ready to swap places. Vi closed her eyes and let out a soft sigh.

  “Thank you,” she murmured. “I leave it to you.”

  Her physical eyes opened once more. But all Vi continued to see was darkness. Tonight was the beginning of the end as Vi relinquished her body to Yargen’s will.

  When she came to, hours later, the watch was gone. Vi could only assume that it had been given to Vhalla, but her mind was blank on the details. Try as she might, Vi couldn’t quite graps why the watch had been so important in the first place.

  Every time she reached for the explanation she knew existed, the words evaporated like morning dew.

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Consciousness had faded in and out over the past few weeks. She would go to sleep somewhere, and wake up somewhere else. Her movements were sometimes jerky and sometimes fluid. Vi could feel the goddess settling in, as gracefully as trying to squeeze into a too-tight pair of trousers. Except, the trousers were her skin.

  But mortal bodies and mortal minds were surprisingly flexible things… or at least, they could be when prodded enough. The transition wasn’t easy, but Vi’s awareness slowly returned with consiste
ncy, and she started to remember more hours than she forgot. For as much as Yargen wanted to be fully in control, they were still missing a piece of the goddess’s essence. Thus, for now, the goddess had to continue to work with Vi, making her will known with whispers or outright commands.

  Vi stood at the top of the palace, watching the battle for the future of the Dark Isle unfold. How she’d made it back to Solarin and sneaked past Victor’s barriers in the city was unknown to her. Aldrik and Vhalla had ridden into the city with an army from the West, North, and East. Vi didn’t move from her spot the entire first day of the battle. The second day of fighting dawned and Vi saw the tides of war already shifting in their favor.

  It wouldn’t be long now.

  She twisted the watch that bore the sun and wing around her neck, staring out the window. This was not her watch. The watch Vi had carried had been smooth and unblemished. That watch had carried something important to her…

  … something…

  What it was eluded her now.

  She’d last seen the watch she now wore on Vhalla’s neck, when they were leaving the North after the end of the war. How it had jumped from Vhalla’s person to hers was a mystery lost in the darkness of that last, long night in the Crossroads. It was a mystery Vi didn’t try to remember. Yargen assured her it was better not to think about it. And, frankly, it seemed so insignificant in the face of all the horrible things she’d seen and let transpire over the years.

  Day by day, her emotions became more muted. Perhaps it was survival, since she was now sharing a palace with the mortal lunatic, Victor, who was becoming more and more twisted by the powers his body was not meant to house. Raspian was chewing up Victor alive, savoring each bite of the mortal man.

  Or perhaps she was unfazed by the horrors, and the human part of her had left entirely with Taavin. All that remained was the Champion, a vessel waiting to become the goddess.