“Feathered Prince? Is that you?” a voice asked, and I spun to see Ashareed my son pulling himself up from the dust. The blood drained from my face. I’d watched him sucked into the darkness only minutes ago.
“My son!” I gasped. “You live?”
Tears filled my eyes, but I blinked them harshly away. The Princes of Baojang did not cry. But as I looked at our city – the last outpost we’d tried to hold against the evil of the black creatures – crying seemed to be the only sane thing to do. That, or laughing. Children leapt to life, throwing themselves into the embrace of their parents, warriors strong and powerful stood again like straight spears, and the women were already singing. Singing the song of victory. Singing the song of freedom.
“I feel it in the air,” Ashuna said from beside me. I spared the Magika a quick look. His face had fallen over the past months as the magic leaked away from the world, but now it was free of lines as he looked to the heavens, arms reaching up. “It’s everywhere! It’s back. Feathered Prince, we can fill the aquifers again. Magic has returned to Baojang!”
“Magic!” the awed whispers of my people filled the air. “Magic!”
Light filled my vision – returned me to the bright light under the water.
And then I was seeing somewhere new – a dark cave. Behind me stood the last of the people and hatchling dragons. There were no warriors. We had lost the last of them an hour ago. Tears stung my eyes, but I refused to cry. It would help nothing to cry now. It would not save my sister Zin or her crying child. It would not save the bouncing hatchlings behind me. I had seen their mother fall from the sky, fighting until she was lost in the darkness of the Draven. I’d watched Tor on her back, screaming insults at them as he tried to fight with that ridiculous staff of his. They’d died defending our retreat. They’d died trying to get us to safety.
I was more proud of them than I could say.
But pride wouldn’t save these children. And I’d run out of ideas. There were no other ways out of the cave. Silence filled my ears and darkness stole my sight. I froze in one place and tried to find peace. It was hard to find in a mind that screamed to fight. But if I lashed out, I might hurt the children.
Light flashed across my vision.
So, this was what death felt like.
And then suddenly I could see again. I could hear the babies crying, their older siblings trying to comfort them. We’d tied them to the older ones’ backs. Their mothers had been lost along the path to our final hiding spot. One by one.
“Zyla?” But no. That was Shanla’s voice. Impossible. The darkness had taken her not twenty minutes ago. “Hazrin? Haleen?”
Her children streaked past me, throwing themselves into her arms.
I could feel my confusion building along with something much more dangerous – hope.
Something was almost glowing on the ground. I reached down and picked it up. It was a stone. Only it wasn’t glowing, it was the opposite of glowing, as if a dark haze was around it. There was another one a little further up the path. I ran to it and snatched it up. And then another and another. As I followed the stones, I found the women I’d thought we’d lost – alive and desperate for their children.
It wasn’t until I broke through the entrance of the cave into the desert beyond that I realized what had happened.
I fell to my knees, sobbing with relief as my sister came up from behind me and put a hand on my shoulder.
“I told you not to lose hope, Zyla. I told you there was a chance.”
“But after he died,” I choked on the words. Out in the desert before us, men and oosqui were picking themselves up off the sand and standing. I knew they had been dead. I’d watched them fall. Every one of them.
“My Bataar lives,” she said with a smug satisfaction. “I feel him out there far from here. He is confused, but he will find me.”
I looked to the horizon, but I was afraid to ask.
She ended my suspense.
“The Ko’roi lives, also. He is angry. I can see him in the future making someone pay for all this.”
Laughter bubbled from my throat as I tucked my head into my arms and sobbed with relief. He was alive. He was angry. I’d never been so happy to hear that before.
Chapter Sixteen
The world went white again, and then the visions vanished, and it was just me in the water, bleeding and holding Atura, surprised by the shocked look on her face. I let her go like dropping a snake.
Behind her, the Haroc still flared with energy, the blazing white tendrils of power from inside the Haroc reached out, snatching me up and drew me in close. I didn’t mind. If I was going to die, then I wanted to die like this.
Were his visions true? Had those people come back from death? The children? The parents? The dragons?
It’s all true.
I felt myself smiling even as my energy slowly slipped away, bleeding into the seawater. It was worth it, then. It was all worth it.
One of the tendrils was pulling someone else in beside me – the dark-skinned man. Only his pretty eyes were clenched in pain, his full lips pressed firmly together to keep from crying out. His hands clamped around a bloody gash in his chest and his breathing was shallow.
I was sorry to see that. I would have liked to have known him better.
Another person was pulled toward the Haroc from beside me – Atura. She looked ill. And as I watched, she leaned over in the grasp of the tendrils and vomited, retching long and hard until I thought it might kill her. Fortunately for me, nothing came up except for a single glowing stone.
She slumped in the grasp of the tendril as another tendril of light snatched the stone up, too.
Everything seemed so much brighter – as if the sky had been opened and light was finally pouring down. Oh wait, we weren’t in the sky, we were in the ocean.
My mind was muddled, confused.
Rain started to fall, thick and hard. No, not rain. Because we were in the ocean. It took me a moment to realize that they were rocks. And they didn’t glow. They did the opposite of glowing. They sucked the light from around them in a dark haze like the opposite of a glow.
I blinked stupidly at them. It was hard to form thoughts properly.
There was another flare of light – so bright, so strong, that it seemed to consume everything.
All pain fled with that light and I was floating, floating.
I closed my eyes and let it take me. I was at the end. And the end was good. It was worth everything it had taken to get here. Worth every pain and heartache.
In my mind’s eye, I could see more visions of people running to hug loved ones. These people wore the strange robes of Bubblers – the ones that were tight at wrists and ankles. I felt a pang of recognition. Every memory I’d been forced to have leapt with delight at their shrieks of joy.
Gratitude filled me like a rising tide – not just gratitude for myself or my loved ones but gratitude for the miracle that had brought back magic to the whole world – that had made scenes like this possible in every country and land I knew.
It would be months – maybe even years – to rebuild the cities, to replace the evil rulers with good, to restore the right use of magic. And maybe I wouldn’t get to see any of it.
And I was still grateful. Grateful beyond grateful for life and hope and beauty.
I’d known what we were fighting for, but I didn’t really know until right now.
It was all worth it, Nasataa agreed.
And then his voice faded, and I opened my eyes, shocked to realize that I wasn’t being held by the tendril anymore. I wasn’t just floating in the light, I was floating upward through the water in a sea of bubbles, a strange, almost magical current pushing me upward. Water thrust me forward like a great arm. I would die with the sun in my face on the surface and the song of the sea in my ears.
I could hear it again, I realized. I hadn’t noticed how long it had been since I heard it. Perhaps it was linked, somehow, with the Blue dragons and their safet
y. It struck me as odd that I could remember that when so much of the rest was lost to me.
I was almost to the surface. I could see it bright above me as the waters lightened and became clearer. And then the man who had fought alongside me at the Haroc floated up beside me, his eyes still clenched shut, but his hands had slipped away from his chest, revealing the hole in it – no longer staining the water, no longer a ragged tear. It was healing. New skin, glossy and thin-looking, covered the hole and the pain wrinkles on his face were smoothing away.
I looked down at my belly and chest, barely daring to look. I was still afraid of what I’d see. But I had no reason to be. My clothing was still tattered beyond reason but the skin of my chest and belly no longer hung in ruined rags. Like his wound, they were closing over. I wasn’t free of pain because I was dying but because I was healing.
I gasped.
And as if my gasp had woken him, the man gasped, too.
My eyes shot to his just as they flickered open.
They widened with the sight of me, going warm as hot honey and a smile dawned slowly across his face. He was so beautiful.
“Seleska,” he murmured, reaching for me. Yes, that was my name. I remembered that much, at least.
I let him draw me into a gentle embrace as we continued to rush through the water. I still didn’t know who he was, but something told me that he mattered to me. And I honored that by allowing his touch. My body responded on its own, melting into him as if it remembered what my mind could not. And then his warm lips were on mine and at their touch, everything came rushing back.
Heron!
This was Heron. I remembered him. I remembered his shy look beside the campfire in our home village. I remembered how he joked with my father, Renny. How he fixed my mother’s favorite pot. I could remember my parents!
I kissed him back, joy shooting through me from the peak of my forehead to the tips of my toes as I let the memories fill me again.
I wanted this moment burned into my mind with them forever. The memory of this kiss – of this triumph.
It was a long time until he released me, and this time, when his eyes sought mine, my eyes were projecting warmth, too. Our fingers found each other, twining into an unbreakable clasp that mirrored our hearts moments before our heads broke through the surface of the water.
Chapter Seventeen
We surfaced into a calm sea, but the calmness lasted only a moment before something seemed to explode below us, shooting us up into the air. We crashed back into the waves which rocked and swelled now, but I kept a hand tangled in Herons’ my gaze seeking his.
“Nasataa,” I gasped.
Go. His voice was very faint.
I took a deep breath, studying the water. Perhaps I should dive back in and find him.
Already the choppy waves were pulling us along, their swells five or even ten times as high as I was. I wasn’t sure how far we’d already been pulled.
Around us, other heads were bobbing to the surface – but they were too far away to swim to. All of us were being pulled by the current.
We rose up on a mighty swell and as we reached the top Heron called to me.
“Look! An island!”
He was right. It was a small island with sandy beaches and a rocky hill in the center. Trees lined the edge of the beach. But I saw no sign of humanity, no sign of anything that might mean civilization or ships or ways to get off the island.
I plunged my head beneath the water, but I was lost now. If I swam back through the waves, I might find the Haroc – but I’d just as likely find our enemies. And I would have to do it without Heron. As I watched, I could see him tiring and I shared his bone-weariness. We may be healed, but our trials had left us exhausted, clinging to one another as if we were each other’s only hope.
“You did it,” I told him through chattering teeth as we fell down the swell into a dip between waves. I hadn’t even realized I was cold until then. “You got Nasataa into the Haroc.”
“And you got it open at the exact right moment,” his pride was obvious. “I was so worried about you, Seleska – in enemy hands for all that time. I was worried that you would die. Worse, that they would steal your memories.”
“They did,” I said, giving him a brave grin. “But you kissed them back.”
He looked at me with wonder and then it changed into an impish grin. “I guess you’ll have to keep kissing me to keep them.”
“I guess I will,” I said with a laugh. We couldn’t embrace while we were both swimming, but we kept our hands held together.
“The whole time we were climbing that mountain – even when we couldn’t hear or see anything – your little dragon’s faith never wavered. He was sure you’d get the Haroc open at the right time.”
“He was so brave,” I said, my heart melting at the thought of him. “I’m worried about him. All alone.”
“He’s tougher than you think – more grown-up than you realize. He told me to go, Seleska. Whatever he needs to do in the Haroc he needs to do on his own.”
He was speaking to Heron, then. That was a big deal. I nodded in acceptance.
“I was worried about you, too,” I said. “I never thought we’d survive any of this.”
Heron pulled me closer. “Want to live on a remote island with me, little honey?”
“I don’t think I have a choice,” I said with a laugh, but my heart was lighter than it had been since the first time I’d lifted Nasataa to my shoulder. He was the Chosen One. He’d done what he had to do. And now I was just the Guardian he didn’t need anymore. Maybe it would be okay to spend some time with Heron on an island. “Even if I did have the choice, I think I’d still pick yes.”
He laughed, pulling me close and then wrapping his arms around me so that we both sank just a little under the water. The waves were still drawing us to the island, slowly but surely, but right now I didn’t care about any of that. I was in Heron’s arms, safe and full of love and all I wanted to do in that moment was show him that he had my heart, too.
Chapter Eighteen
I had expected a deserted island to be more deserted. As Heron and I washed up on the shore in each other’s arms, a cry sounded. We scrambled to our feet in the sand but the figure who had cried out my name was already sprinting down the beach toward me.
My jaw dropped when I saw who it was.
“Hubric?”
He was upon us before I could say more, his old legs as spry as a child’s. He grabbed me in a big hug.
“You did it! You made it!”
“You helped,” I said, wide-eyed. Shock filled me, rocking me to the core. This was something I’d never expected. Something completely unhoped-for. “Didn’t you? It was you in Atura’s head who pushed Nasataa into the Haroc.”
“I did,” he agreed, stepping back and grinning at both of us.
“And now you’re alive, just like everyone else who was killed by having their souls sucked out of their bodies. How does that even work?”
His body shouldn’t be here. It should be back in the hills of Haz’drazen’s lands where we had left him.
“Magic,” he said with a glint in his eye.
I made an exasperated sound and Heron laughed. “I don’t think she likes your explanation, old man.”
“Well, it’s the only one you’ll get. That and prophecy. But what did you think would happen when the little dragon opened the Haroc and restored magic to the world? It undid a lot of things that were done with magic – or with the removal of magic, I should say. It restored things back to how they should be. Refilled the reservoirs, restored life that was stolen.”
“Does that mean ... does that mean everything evil is undone now?” I barely dared to ask him.
“No,” he said gently. “I don’t have my Kyrowat back. There will be others who were lost who won’t be restored now that the Draven are gone.”
I felt a pang of sadness, but I had to press on.
“But the Draven are gone? Really all gone?”
“Yes,” he said with a grin. “They were only alive on the life they stole from others. When that life was taken back, they shrank to nothing. Or maybe I should say that they shrank to stones and that they are littered all over the ground. But I doubt anyone will be able to restore life to those stones. Not in our lifetimes at least.”
I felt a chill. Because I knew that if something evil could be done, then someone would do it.
But he was right. No one knew how to do it yet. We would have to set up safeguards and ways to defend against that.
“And the Troglodytes?” I asked timidly.
“Are gone,” Hubric said sadly. “Their lives bought ours. Their deaths bought our freedom.”
Sadness struck me, but Heron was looking at something else. “Is that someone in the water?”
He was right. There was a body bobbing in the water. Without thinking, I leapt back in, rushing to where it was deep enough to swim and then swimming for all I was worth to the body. Was I too late?
Whoever it was bobbed on the surface, face down. As soon as I reached them, I flipped them over, towing them from behind. Dark hair was plastered over the face of what was obviously a Bubbler in those robes. But it was still a human. I pushed the water from her lungs as I swam grateful to hear her take a breath. If she’d been wearing a mask or collar before, it was gone now.
By the time I got her to the beach, Heron and Hubric helping me to pull her up on the sand, she was breathing again, though weakly.
I looked down at her, afraid to move the hair from her face. Afraid, because I was already realizing who it was.
“Seleska?” she moaned, and my heart froze in my chest.
“Forgiveness?” Hubric asked gently.
And though it turned my stomach I brushed her hair from her face. Maybe if I did forgive I could feel it later. Because I certainly didn’t feel it now.
“Atura,” I said, ignoring the roughness of my voice. “Hubric is back. So are all the people who you Rock Eaters turned into stone. Do you know what that means?” She nodded weakly, but I wasn’t done. “It means your reign of terror is over. It means no more treating people like animals or resources.” My tone softened despite myself as I said the next part. “It means your mother is out there somewhere, looking for you.”
Dragon Tide Omnibus 2) Page 30