I stifled a laugh. “You killed the Unending before. The universe is definitely telling you something, but you really suck at decrypting the message, Corbin. It’s not telling you that things are hard, you fool. It’s making you choose between your daughter and your ambitions, and you are making the wrong choice.”
“The irony of having to kill my child does not escape me, Kelara, if that’s what you’re trying to get at,” he said, his tone clipped. “But it’s not my ambitions I’m fighting for. It’s eternity itself. I will have another child someday. I will have a chance to atone for this sin. But if I lose my people’s immortality, I will never get it back. And that, dear Reaper, is not an outcome I am willing to accept.”
Shaking my head slowly, I stared at him, my lips twisted with disgust. “If you still can’t see the error in your ways, Corbin, you’re in for a rude awakening. Even if you bring the Spirit Bender back, Death will still become free someday. Maybe not now. Maybe not tomorrow or in a hundred years. But she will come for you. All of you. We’re trying to give you a shot at survival, because if she comes to Visio, no one will be spared. Not you, not the Darklings, not a single Aeternae. You are complicit in the imprisonment and torture of one of her most precious creations. She doesn’t take this stuff lightly.”
“Let her try. I trust our lord and creator.”
“Good grief, you delusional imbecile,” I muttered. “We have three of Spirit’s soul shards already. You’re not bringing him back.”
I registered movement to my left. It was beyond the green fires, and Corbin didn’t see it. He couldn’t, because Soul, bless his heart, was keeping himself in a subtle form that only I could see. Corbin had a scythe or two on him, but a Reaper could still conceal his presence, and that was exactly what Soul was doing. He watched me in silence, the look of longing and concern persisting on his face.
I wanted to tell him I was sorry, but I wasn’t. Not really. My choice, even if somewhat reckless, had been solely for the purpose of shielding him from a similar capture. As I sat beside Corbin in the middle of a camp littered with Darkling corpses, I found myself even more convinced that I’d made the right move.
Soul gave me a faint smile, and a glimmer persisted in his galaxy eyes. It was his way of telling me that things would turn out okay in the end. Of course, he couldn’t really promise such a thing, but I knew he would do his best. It meant the world to me. Soul had good intentions.
“So what?” Corbin replied.
“Huh?” I mumbled, freshly torn from my thoughts.
“So what if you have three soul shards? Do you think you’ll get to keep them forever?”
“You underestimate us,” I said. “Petra’s out of the equation. It’s only a matter of time before Danika falls, too.”
Corbin leaned forward, his dark eyes turned to slits as he held back a smile. “And you underestimate us, Kelara, if you think I don’t know what you and your people are up to.”
I took his response seriously. There’s wasn’t a shred of delusion in his statement, only immutable confidence. Those were the words of a man who knew more than I did, and I couldn’t allow myself to be kept out of the loop here. I needed to find out more.
“How could you possibly know what my crew and I are working on?” I asked, hoping he’d tell me enough to shed light on how much the Darklings actually knew about our operations.
He got up, yanking the chain connected to my rune collar. I stumbled and landed on all fours, forced to scramble back to my feet as he briskly walked toward the eastern edge of the green fire ring where I’d seen Soul. He stopped beside one of the emerald flames, and I could see Soul standing only yards away, looking at Corbin with raw, festering hatred.
“Right now, two of your friends, specifically Esme Vaughn and Trev Blayne have just learned that Jolie Jasperstone and Rennert Gauss have already surrendered their soul shards for the return of the Spirit Bender. They’ve also just read a letter from Danika, and they know she’s headed for Roano, where you’re keeping everything and everyone—my daughter included,” Corbin said. I froze beside him, unable to look away from his stone-cold face. “You see, I’m not in the habit of running around too much in an effort to make my daughter surrender. I’d rather focus on bringing our maker back, and he can take care of Valaine for me. I would sincerely hate to cut her head off myself. In that sense, I suppose you’re right. It’s hard to live with something like this.”
I needed a moment to pull myself together. “You know about Roano…” Glancing ahead, I could see that Soul was equally troubled.
“Of course. I knew you people would try to rope the Seniors into this from the moment you realized the true reach of the Darklings,” Corbin declared. “I made sure I’d have eyes and ears among them once that came to pass.”
“Hold on. You mean to tell me one of the Seniors is a Darkling?” I managed, barely able to string the words together as my whole world came crashing down, the very earth beneath my feet crumbling.
Corbin gave me a sideways smile. “Kelara. When I told you that you are seriously underestimating us, I meant it. Everything will come up in my favor eventually. Danika is on the move, we have most of the soul shards, and you’re holed up in a ruined city with a patched-up spell work of Word and death magic. You’re not equipped nor capable of handling the fire we’re about to rain down on you.”
Soul had already caught the warning. Maybe Corbin knew he was still around, but he didn’t seem at all concerned. That shouldn’t have come as a surprise anymore. Clearly, we’d been the ones left behind and in the dark, while the enemy knew more about us than we knew about them.
Corbin had an objective and a location already. Tristan, Valaine, Thayen—they were all in his crosshairs. And I was stuck here. Soul would surely warn them, but now his interdimensional pockets were in danger, too. If the Darklings got past the city defenses, if they reached the north tower… Soul couldn’t stay here any longer, and I had no way of telling him that. Not without alerting Corbin, since my telepathy had been cut off.
Roano was on the Darklings’ map.
Tristan
Unending wasn’t ready to bring us back to the surface. She had been stripped of her freedom and betrayed by the Aeternae. I had watched it all happen as more memories unfolded around us. Slowly but surely, Unending was able to navigate them with greater ease despite the pain they brought to the surface.
I watched her fight the Spirit Bender, not long after their last encounter. Even under the first seal, she still had some fighting left in her. He cut her down, and her scythe hit the ground, instantly losing its shimmer. Before she could pull herself back up, he snagged a strand of her hair and placed it over the blade of his scythe.
Black clouds gathered overhead, storms brewing with elemental fury. I wondered if this was the local Hermessi’s reaction to what the Spirit Bender was doing. I doubted I’d ever find out more about them, though. All I could do was interpret what I was seeing. Unending’s hair melted into pure light as Spirit whispered a spell. Gradually, it changed its shape into a ring, taking on a silvery shimmer. The metal bound itself around an iridescent, tear-shaped stone. Spirit put it on his finger. “Once it’s set, you’re done for,” he told Unending as she managed to recover her scythe.
“What is that?” I asked.
“It’s the second seal. I’m about to lose my physical form,” Valaine explained.
“Forgive me, but it’s confusing for me to talk to you, while also watching you relive the worst of your memories.”
She turned her head and offered a delicate smile. “It’s okay. It’s still me, Tristan, regardless of the name I bear. The Unending, Valaine, Maira, Eliana… it’s all the same. I am them, and they are me.” Indeed, the only difference between Valaine and the Unending at this point was in their physical appearance. Despite the signature black hair and pale skin, there wasn’t much else they shared. “I’m fighting Spirit for my freedom,” she added. “I couldn’t let him get away with this. The Aeternae w
ere too scared to come back at the time, as I later learned, but I didn’t mind. I needed a clear and open field to confront Spirit without distractions.”
Not ready to give up yet, Unending vanished for a split-second, then reappeared behind Spirit. He ducked just in time to avoid the cut of her scythe, then bolted away from her. He was working different angles, trying to find a way to hit her before she could do real damage. I could tell he was worried. Something wasn’t working out as he’d expected. The ring wasn’t ready.
“You see, as soon as I realized what had happened and shortly after Spirit hit me, I took advantage of his arrogance. He’d begun promising Arya power like she’d never seen before, and they were both so absorbed with his speech that they didn’t see me moving. I snatched my scythe off the floor and left, knowing the Spirit Bender would come looking for me. I realized then that he didn’t think everything through.”
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“I still had my weapon. He’d bound me to Visio, but I could move. I could cast death magic. I could retaliate, hence why I planted the seeds of Black Fever on Visio, from my own misery. Here, he’s trying to fix that.”
I sighed deeply. “Unfortunately, he succeeds. Right?”
“Yes…”
The Unending went in for another attack, but Spirit was ready for her. He swerved around and cut her across the back with his scythe. She cried out in agonizing pain, a scream ripping from her throat as she fell to her knees. It coincided with lightning streaking across the black sky, quickly followed by deafening thunderclaps that made the ground tremble.
This was the defining moment, as Spirit hit her scythe hand with another blue pulse. Unending’s weapon was thrown away, and he was quick to grab it off the ground. He used it to draw a circle around her, as the wound on her back burned bright red, glowing from the inside. He drew a second circle around it, followed by several scrawled symbols. The dirt crumbled under the sharp blade’s tip. Each symbol became illuminated as soon as Spirit completed the entire scheme.
Unending looked at it, genuinely startled. The pain from her back subsided, quickly replaced by panic as she understood what Spirit was doing. “No, don’t. Don’t do this!” she shouted.
“You won’t be needing this anymore, darling,” he replied, gazing lovingly at her scythe. He raised his finger hand—the jewel was complete, the shimmer of its tear-shaped stone catching my eye. I’d seen it before. “This is your second seal now.”
“That ring looks familiar,” I told Valaine, and she nodded.
“It’s my father’s. He’s worn it for as long as I can remember,” she said. That meant Corbin had the second seal. We’d have to find a way to get to the very person who wanted to kill Valaine before Unending’s liberation, and the thought alone horrified me.
“So, the first seal was the cut. The second is the ring. Right?”
“Yes. But the order and method with which I was sealed will not be the order and method with which I’ll be unsealed. Remember that, Tristan, because it matters,” Valaine replied. “Spirit might not have thought this all through, but he came prepared. He was a brilliant strategist, and few knew how to wield death magic like he did.”
Spirit towered over the Unending, his back straight and his chin up, pride beaming from his galaxy eyes. “This should be enough to keep you under control, my darling. I can’t have you throwing tantrums and looking for ways to reach out to mommy dearest.”
Before she could reply, Unending screamed from the bottom of her lungs—so loud, so sharp, that I cringed and covered my ears. The sound was unbearable, rippling across time and space as if the universe itself was suffering and mourning for this moment, this terrible loss.
Her physical form began to fade. Her eyes were round and filled with horror. She couldn’t escape the circles, nor could she touch Spirit anymore, though she did reach out to try. Her hand went right through his. Spirit chuckled, unable to contain his childlike and psychotic giddiness. The circles he’d drawn around her lit up in a similar reddish hue as the stone on his seal ring. The magic was complete, and it broke my heart to watch it all in such troubling detail.
“We would’ve been great together, you know,” he said.
The Unending had lost her voice. Her words were silent, faint movements of her lips as she shimmered away and vanished from sight. “Where did you go?” I asked.
“Everywhere and nowhere,” Valaine replied. “I became one with Visio against my will. I’m in the air and in the dirt. In every drop of rain. Every blade of grass. Every spark that lights a fire in this world. I understand now. I see it all. I hear it all. I feel it all…”
“You lost yourself,” I managed, my eyes stinging from unexpected tears. She took my hand in hers and squeezed gently. I could feel her in the midst of this memory. I could feel her in the center of my soul.
Footsteps caught our attention. Ragged breaths. Whimpers as the Aeternae finally caught up with Unending and Spirit. Mira and Kemi were here. Arya and a few others, too. They looked terrified and heartbroken, and I wondered if Arya had told them anything about what she’d witnessed. I doubted it. We would’ve learned about this upon meeting the Seniors, for sure, but we didn’t.
“What… what did you do?” Mira asked, her eyes glassy as she struggled to keep herself together. She wasn’t doing a good job of it. At least she was clearly remorseful of what she’d unwittingly helped with.
“I fixed a problem,” Spirit replied, unsympathetic to her obvious plight. He turned to look at them, but he wasn’t at all impressed. “It’s the least you deserve for your betrayal.”
“You’re the one who trapped her!” Kemi replied, balking at his claims.
“You’re the ones who stood by and did nothing for two weeks while I fed you my propaganda,” Spirit shot back. “At least be honest with yourselves. Your gift of immortality required a sacrifice. This was it.”
“Where is she?” Mira growled, fists balled tightly. Kemi held her back as she tried to move toward the Spirit Bender. It wouldn’t have ended well for Mira had she been left to her own devices here.
“She’s here. But you will never see her again,” he said.
“Set her free!” Kemi shouted.
Spirit chuckled, hands casually resting on his hips, both scythes already gone. “I did you all a favor. The least you could do is say thanks. If I bring her back, she’ll make you all mortal again. On top of that, she’ll punish you, too. Chances are she’ll mess with you even in her current state. I wouldn’t put it past her. She let something slip before I put the second seal on her, anyway. My sister is remarkably resourceful when she’s mad. You’ve never seen your maker angry, believe me. None of you would live to tell the tale.”
The Aeternae stared at each other. They didn’t have anything to say. Shame lit red fires in their cheeks. Sweat dripped down their faces as guilt ate away at them. They had a hard time adjusting to this uncomfortable truth, and as much as I wanted to feel sorry for them, I couldn’t.
These people had believed Spirit, a complete stranger, without even telling Unending about his presence on Visio. They’d been too easy to manipulate. It made their entire species almost as dangerous as Spirit himself.
“And to think you were actually seeing all this… I can’t imagine how it must have felt,” I said to Valaine.
“It hurts… I can sense the fear in Mira’s heart. I can tell she’s worried about the repercussions, and she has every reason to feel this way. The Black Fever will emerge, sometime in the future. And at my third reincarnation, we all know what will happen,” she said. “More suffering will come their way, and they don’t fully realize it. Not yet, anyway.”
“You’ll curse them with blood drinking,” I replied. For me, it didn’t seem like the worst thing that could happen. I’d accepted that blood was a sacred part of being a vampire from the moment I’d been turned. I’d said goodbye to the sun, and I had embraced the sacrifices required to live an eternal life. The Aeternae would do th
e same, too.
“Yes.”
“I regret that this happened to you,” I told her. “This whole thing is the result of poor choices.”
“I regret it, too.”
Arya was silent. Mira broke down crying. Her knees sank into the dirt as she covered her face with both hands. Kemi stayed close, putting his arms around her shoulders. The other Aeternae were just as devastated, as the consequences of their actions had finally come to fruition. Their maker was, in a sense at least, gone. And the Spirit Bender had hijacked their entire existence, which they’d been taking for granted for a while. Clearly, the universe had a way of hitting back.
“They broke my heart,” Valaine said.
“And they paid the price, don’t you think?”
“But they’ve been suffering for almost five million years now. I think it’s enough. We must break this circle, Tristan.”
“Show me the third seal.”
There had been a method to the Spirit Bender’s madness and a madness to his method. He’d come to Visio with a plan and a backup scheme, but he hadn’t expected the Unending to fight back so ferociously. He’d risen to the challenge, however, and he’d accomplished something truly frightening. Outside in the real world, we risked seeing him again.
I didn’t want him to come back. His sole purpose had always been to hurt Death through Unending and through every other method at his disposal. The Darklings were playing with forces they didn’t fully understand, and it was bound to blow up in their faces eventually. The innocents didn’t deserve to become collateral damage, and Unending deserved her freedom.
The deeper we slipped into her subconscious, the more convinced I became that this was the only way. Her awakening, the breaking of her seals—the Unending was our only shot at restoring the balance and saving all the people we cared about. A universe in chaos was bound to create more conflict, more danger, more death. That was what the Darklings refused to understand.
The reactions to their actions would impact all of us.
A Shade of Vampire 85: A Shard of Soul Page 20