Pain (Curse of the Gods Book 5)

by Jaymin Eve

  “Activate,” I muttered.

  The screams were unearthly, as though I had just torn Pica into a million pieces and was dragging her behind me as I passed unharmed through the darkness. I remembered the feeling of Rau’s curse ripping into me and how it had torn my soul apart, and it seemed suddenly fitting that I had eventually done the same to him, though I hadn’t realised exactly what I had been doing at the time. I felt guilty for Pica’s screams, though. As crazy as she was, all of her insanity seemed to stem from the same point of reference: the loss of her child. At the very least, I could understand how something inside of her had snapped, and it hurt to have to fight against her, knowing where her pain stemmed from.

  When I slammed into hard ground again, I could hear her beside me, curled up in the dry, colourless dirt, sobbing. I pulled the cuff from her wrist and stood, looking around. Several of the god-children were watching, though they did it from afar—their eyes peeking out at us from behind scraggly vegetation.

  “I’m sorry I hurt you,” I told Pica. “And I’m sorry I lied to you about Rau. I don’t intend to bring him back to life. I don’t intend to bring you back, either. But I think … I think you might find a reason to stay here after all.”

  She didn’t even seem to be listening to me; she remained hunched over, crying. The guilt inside me increased—until I saw the dagger I had dropped in the dirt. Pica had tried to kill me, and would have killed me, just so she could play happy families with my corpse. I didn’t have the luxury of feeling sorry for her.

  “Pica,” I said, louder this time. My voice stronger. “Look past the pain and see where you are. Understand what this means. You can finally have your daughter back.”

  She stopped crying, lifting herself from the dirt. I quickly grabbed the knife before she could use it on me, remembering that it was possible to finally kill a god within this realm—once and for all.

  “She is here,” I told Pica. “This is where Staviti sent her after taking her from you. She is here, somewhere, Pica. You just have to find her.”

  “H-how will I find her?” Pica asked, her tears vanishing as though they had never existed in the first place. She took several steps toward me but I backed away, holding the knife out in front of me.

  “Try calling for her?” I suggested, still backing away. “Did she have a name?”

  “Willy…,” Pica muttered, her face creasing up in pain, her eyes closing. “Willy … Jill … my baby’s name was Jillian, but I called her Jilly.”

  Pain constricted in my chest, but I didn’t lower the knife. I had to keep reminding myself that this woman had deceived me and tried to kill me.

  “Go,” I ordered. “Go and find her, Pica.”

  She began to walk away, but paused after a few steps, levelling me with a single lucid look.

  “I should not be thanking you … but I feel free, now,” she admitted before turning her back on me and walking away.

  I waited until I could no longer see her before I glanced down at the items in my hands. The chain and the dagger. Two pathways back to Topia, for the weight of two souls.

  “You see everything that happens in Topia.” I spoke into the silence. “You know I’m here. You can come out now.”

  A dry chuckle met my statement, and a robed man suddenly appeared, his grey, almost lifeless form separating from the equally grey and lifeless trunk of a tree several feet away.

  “Willa Knight,” Jakan greeted, walking toward me. “You have surprised me yet again.”

  “Doing what’s expected of me was never my strong suit,” I admitted, casting my eyes over him as though there were something important to catch in his appearance.

  A hint of me, perhaps.

  “I came here for you,” I admitted.

  He stared at the instruments in my hands. “I found a way out of here once, but I had a lot more power then. My brother caught me, weakened me, and sent me back, and I have remained weak. This land is only linked to Topia through a single, very narrow point, and I have spent many life-cycles here, my power slowly draining away. I had thought that I would eventually become mortal and die here, as mortals do in Minatsol. I never thought that I would go back again.”

  “How did my mother get here?” I asked.

  “When Staviti sent me back, I had a soul-bond with your mother. The piece of her that was connected to me was torn from her soul and transported here with me. I am sorry for that, Willa. I did my best to protect her, to protect you both … I’m sorry I failed.”

  “You’re my father.” It was a statement.

  He nodded. “Yes, I am your father. I have watched you through your mother’s eyes for many life-cycles. I have been with you always, Willa.”

  My father had been a nothing concept to me for my entire life. He didn’t exist. My mother never told me any stories of him, or described his looks, or even spoke of a name. It was almost as if I had been brought to life from her alone.

  I hadn’t wanted or missed a father.

  So why the hell was I feeling so emotional? Why did I want to curl forward and release the sobs threatening to erupt from me?

  “I’m not sure how to process this new … thing,” I admitted. “I’m not sure that I can just start having a father now, after all of these life-cycles of being basically parentless. But … maybe we can start as friends.” His expression didn’t change, but his eyes almost looked like they darkened. It was difficult to tell in this landscape.

  “I can do friends,” he finally said.

  I nodded. “Okay, great. Well, friend, I could really use a helping hand in freeing the worlds from your brother’s tyrant ways.”

  Jakan grinned. It was a nice smile, and for the first time I saw hints of the shape of my smile around his jawline and cheeks.

  “If you can get me out of here, then I can help you take Staviti down. For too long he has abused his power. It’s time to return it to the land.”

  I nodded rapidly. “Yes! I’m so glad you’re not wanting to take over either. I think the land has it sorted, if we just return the balance.”

  Jakan regarded me carefully. “You have the power, if you want to take the world by force. It would be faster than your current path, and easier. Almost a guarantee of success. Are you sure it’s not something you want to consider?”

  Laughter burst from me before I could stop it, echoing eerily around the empty and desolate land. Jakan didn’t laugh, continuing to stare.

  “Can anyone rule absolutely and not become corrupt?” I asked between chuckles. “It’s almost inevitable with having so much power, no matter how good your intentions are at the start. I don’t think one god, sol, or dweller was designed to control all. It’s time for a different system.”

  Jakan reached out and I flinched, but didn’t jump back when his hand landed gently on my shoulder. “I want you to know that I am very proud of you. I always have been, the way you’ve handled the burdens I left you with. It couldn’t have been easy, having god gifts and not realising, thinking that you were cursed. I wished so many times that I could have been there for you, to guide you. But in the end, you didn’t need me.”

  I shook my head and his hand off at the same time. We were heading into emotional territory and I needed to stay focussed.

  “You do what you have to do, you know,” I replied. “Anyone else would have done the same.” And I wasn’t going to tell him how badly I had needed him at times, without even knowing that’s what was missing from my life.

  Jakan looked like he was going to reply, but I cut him off before he could. “So, are you ready to make it back to Topia? To the land of the living?”

  His lips tilted up minutely. “Yes. I’m ready. But the facts remain the same as the last time you were here: you cannot take a whole soul back with you. I’m still a whole soul, you are still part of a soul. Together we would be too much.”

  I held up the dagger. “This is a Crowe weapon, one designed for me. It’s a pathway back as well. Two pathways, two souls.”
>
  Jakan regarded the weapon. “I’ve never seen anyone use a weapon like that to return before,” he said slowly, and my hope sank until he added: “But with your energy, we could possibly make it happen.”

  Another burst of disappointment hit me. “I’m drained,” I choked out. “Pica was holding me in this weird prison that used my energy to power itself. And before that I turned a server into a god. So … I’m barely running at a tenth of my normal energy.”

  There weren’t any active god powers in the imprisonment realm, so I couldn’t feel for the swirl of heat inside to know for sure, but considering I’d come there within a few clicks of leaving my prison, there hadn’t been any time for me to rejuvenate myself. So it stood to reason that I remained at a critically low level of power. Jakan’s expression didn’t fall like I had expected. Instead, he looked thoughtful.

  “There might be another way,” he finally said, straightening to his impressive height—he might actually be taller than Rome, who was the god I measured all heights against. “I’ve tried to avoid thinking about all the ways I could have escaped with you the last time you appeared. Your mother’s body was in danger and you needed to go back as quickly as possible. There wasn’t any time … but after you left, the alternatives haunted me. If we’re going to attempt one of my ideas, we’re going to have to cross parts of the imprisonment realm.” He turned and pointed across a long land of grey nothingness.

  I cleared my throat but didn’t argue. “Let’s get started then,” I said, turning in that direction.

  Jakan didn’t hesitate, striding out. I hurried to follow, falling in at his side. He glanced down to me. “Your energy will not rejuvenate here either,” he informed me, “so this is our only chance.”

  I must have looked as worried as I felt, because the next look he shot me was a little more jovial. “The worst-case scenario would be that you use the chains to return yourself to Topia. I’ve been here for a long time; I can wait a little longer for you to return with full power.”

  I guessed that was true, and I did feel better knowing that this wouldn’t be my only opportunity.

  “Where are we going?” I asked, looking out over the bare land before us.

  “To the mortal glass,” he replied simply.

  I remembered him telling me that he kept track of me through the mortal glass.

  “Do you often stand at the glass?” I asked, wanting to understand this god better. This god who was apparently my father.

  I wasn’t sure that was a concept I’d ever get used to.

  “Yes, it’s the only window I have back to the world. Especially since you took your mother’s soul with you.”

  I stilled. I hadn’t heard her voice inside for a long time, not even when I was in Pica’s prison. I hoped she was okay and that by returning here I hadn’t hurt her somehow.

  “Do you know if it’s possible for me to release her soul back to her?”

  It was one of those deep desires, the sort I was afraid to even admit out loud. Jakan grinned suddenly, and even as a washed-out grey dude, I could see why my mother fell for him. There was a warmth about him that his brother definitely didn’t have. An easy way of being.

  “I don’t think there’s anything you can’t do, Willa Knight,” he said to me. “Don’t underestimate yourself.”

  I was guilty of that, and also of not even trying because I thought I might fail. I had to stop with that sort of attitude. I’d seen miraculous things happen recently. I’d done miraculous things. I had to believe that I could do anything if I worked hard enough at it. Which meant one sun-cycle I would return my mother’s soul to her. I would restore her life, the life that had been robbed from her by a petty whim of Staviti. And if possible, I would even try to return the portion of her soul that had been ripped from her before I had ever even had the chance to know her: when she lost her true love.

  I mentally added it to my list of things to do before I died, along with learning how to knit, baking just one thing without burning it or myself, inventing a new type of dance, and freeing the worlds from Staviti’s reign of terror. Easy done.

  “It’s just over there,” Jakan said, distracting me from my thoughts. I realised that there was actually a spot of colour where he was pointing. Nothing bright, but it still stood out against the dull landscape.

  “That’s the glass?” I wondered out loud.

  “Yes,” he said quickly, “you’re seeing the reflection of its surface. There is just enough light here for a subtle glow.”

  A subtle blue glow to be exact.

  “Brace yourself for the next part,” he told me, and I was about to yell at him, because you shouldn’t tell someone to brace themselves and not tell them what they were bracing for, when I saw the god-children.

  They were everywhere. The lands had been pretty empty up until that point; a few wide, blank eyes poking out from behind the vegetation, but nothing too obvious. Here though, there were dozens of them just hovering around the mortal glass, staring at it.

  “What are they doing?” I asked, my voice catching.

  “They stand here to be closer to their bodies,” he said, tinges of sadness creeping into his words. “To be closer to the world that holds their parents.”

  My feet ground to a halt and I was once again clumsy-cursed-Willa as I almost fell on my face. Jakan latched on to my arm, keeping me steady. “They told me last time that they were somewhere dark,” I whispered, tears creeping up my throat and burning behind my eyes again. “They’re in the cave near the panteras? I was there, I never saw them …” I trailed off, thinking of how dark it was in there, of how much more cave there could have been to explore beyond the glass. The panteras never mentioned them to me, but that was no doubt because of their ‘no interference’ rule.

  “There is a network of caves behind the mortal glass,” Jakan replied. “Every child that Staviti has killed was hidden there, where only he has access. Not even the panteras will venture into those caves. The energy is too dark for them; they are naturally repelled.”

  It was both devastating and a tiny bit unsettling to know that there were a bunch of murdered god-children in the same cave network as me, but it also gave me a sense of hope. I knew where they were. Maybe there was a chance that I could return their souls to their bodies. There had to be a way, even if I was forced to return over and over again with the magical items that could pull them to their bodies.

  I had to at least try.

  Eleven

  “Are they going to attack us?” I asked Jakan as we got closer.

  Their focus remained fixed to the mortal glass as we walked amongst them, and it was an unnerving experience, even though they paid us no attention. Before he could answer my question I quickly added, “And do they stand there all sun-cycle?”

  “All sun-cycle,” he replied quietly. “As time passes their minds and memories deteriorate. The more time passes, the more they are drawn here: to the glass, to their bodies, to the other side. Not that they realised why they’re drawn here. None of them seem to know anymore.” He took a long, deep breath. “And they will not harm you. They are children; their souls remain untainted by the impurity of the worlds.”

  As we passed the outer circle of young, blank faces, tears began to slip down my cheeks. Some of the children were tiny, looking to be no older than two or three. Some of them were as old as six or seven, though they clung to babies, carrying them around as though they were their own. The babies themselves were quiet and they barely struggled or moved. They were as still and blank as the other children.

  “Your brother is a monster,” I choked out in a low whisper.

  Jakan only nodded in reply, and soon we were before the mortal glass. I felt the first shimmer of energy since landing in the imprisonment realm. The energy was Topia: I could sense it on the other side of the glass, despite the fact that there was no evidence of the other land written across the glittering black surface.

  “This is the only connection that exi
sts between Topia and this realm,” Jakan told me. “Topia and Minatsol are connected by many channels, but here … there is only the glass.”

  I still had no idea where the imprisonment realm was in relation to Topia and Minatsol. Was it part of the same land? Or somewhere completely different? How did the gods manage to be banished there when a weapon created by Crowe was used on them? What made Crowe’s weapons so special?

  I had so many questions that would probably never be answered. But at least it was a small measure of relief to know that Topia was connected to this realm through the glass. I hadn’t liked the thought that that we were floating around in an alternate world without a tether to any of the worlds I knew. My thoughts were so tangled that I must have said something out loud without realising, because Jakan shot me a look, as though in reply to a question.

  “The imprisonment realm only exists because of the mortal glass,” he told me. “The glass created this world.”

  “The glass created an entire world?” I asked.

  “That’s how it came to exist,” he confirmed. “Everything is in balance. From Topia, the reverse side of the glass is here. From here, the reverse side of the glass is Topia. For the worlds to have balance, there must always be two sides. For Topia to be perfect, there had to be a place for the darkness and misery to escape, because it can’t just cease to exist.”

  I sucked in a deep breath. “So … how do Crowe’s weapons send gods here?”

  “He steals from the glass,” Jakan answered gruffly. “Chipping away at the stone, and then taking those pieces and forging them into his weapons. It’s the glass that gives his weapons their true power.”

  I stood there blinking at Jakan for several clicks. “That’s why the stone wall had been defiled,” I said, thinking back to what I’d seen in the cave. “Crowe was the one who hurt the glass?”

  Jakan’s expression darkened, and I took that for an answer in itself.

  “In doing so, Crowe has weakened the glass,” he told me. “That is part of the reason I cannot use it any longer to return to Topia. I used to be fed energy through the glass because of my connection to Topia, but the glass was weakened and my connection grew too small. I’ve been here for a long time without the energy of Topia, and I’ve grown too weak to escape, as I once was able to. It took me close to fifty life-cycles to escape this realm the first time, but I was in Topia for no more than a single rotation before Staviti picked up on my energy. When he found me, my weakened state was no match for him, and suddenly I was back here again. When I escaped the second time, I was smarter. I left Topia and fled to Minatsol, and I was able to hide there for some time, quietly gathering my strength again. It wasn’t until you …” He shook his head, trailing off.