Zodiac Academy 9: Restless Stars

Chapter 107

Istumbled down the stairs taking them two, three, four at a time, leaping to the landing then racing on down the next flight. My knees creaked in protest at the rough treatment as my palms splayed against the cold jade walls of the castle to steady myself.

Booming vibrations echoed through those walls, a spattering of dust cascading over my hair and clinging to the clumped strands.

“The treasury!” Lionel bellowed at my back, his footsteps hounding mine, the rest of his advisors charging through the dark behind him.

A Faelight bobbed ahead of me, smacking into the walls of the narrow secret staircase, and I winced as it flickered, threatening to fail in time with the reckless pounding of my heart.

Piled bodies heaped before a throne of Hydra sculls, two glorious queens glaring down at me from the throne they had reclaimed.

“Death,” their combined voices boomed my fate and I cowered away.

The vision made me stumble back and Lionel’s hand slammed into my spine as he thrust me aside.

I gasped, pressing myself to the wall and letting him charge past me, the rest of his advisors scrambling by too, only Madam Monita sparing me a glance, her gaze etched with the terrible reality of our situation.

“What did you see?” she hissed at me.

“By the look on your face, I’d say it aligns with what the bones told you,” I replied, my fingernails biting into the stone wall at my back as I struggled to think of a way out of that fate.

There was one. There had to be one.

“The bones spoke only of an end to come,” she replied. “An end of all that is.”

She jerked away from me as if wanting to leave those words where they were, hanging in the air between us, abandoned as she fled. And maybe she could outrun them if she moved fast enough, but I wasn’t willing to place my fate in something so tenuous as my ability to outpace my foes. No, I would re-write my fortune just as I had done so many times before.

I ran on, charging down the stairs faster and faster, the unmistakable sound of the walls cracking apart around me making my gut clench with terror. They had to hold. They had to. Just a little longer.

Lionel cried out ahead of me and I almost ran headlong into Madam Monita where she had halted on a narrow landing along with all the others, staring at the Dragon King.

“What is it, Sire?” Horace begged as the king sagged back against the wall, clutching at his forearm above the stump where his hand had once been.

“My Bonded,” Lionel panted, his blonde hair no longer quaffed to perfection but lying lank and clinging to his reddened forehead. “All of them are dead.”

“What of the queen?” Madam Monita gasped, and he backhanded her so savagely that her skull cracked against the wall before she crumpled to the ground in a heap.

“I said all of them,” Lionel spat, his eyes wild as he glared from one face to another, hunting for some sign of what to do.

In that moment there was nothing regal about him, nothing kingly or impressive. Even his imposing stature seemed diminished, and all I saw as I looked at him was a weak, sweaty man, running from the fate any other in his position would have stood and faced with honour.

The deafening boom of two Dragons roaring as one made the walls tremble around us, and we all looked back up the stairs towards the abandoned throne room. If every one of Lionel’s Bonded were dead, then that meant those weren’t his Dragons close on our heels – those were his sons come to hunt us down.

Panic threatened to consume our group, uncertainty clasping us in its fist but that wouldn’t do. We couldn’t languish in fear. Our time was running out and that meant we had to move.

“We will make it, my King,” I told him, my voice rough with false prophecy, a certainty to my words which he clung to like they were the lifeline he had so desperately been seeking.

“Of course we will,” he snarled, regaining some composure as he took my words as facts, laying all of his faith in the belief that they were the truth. “We keep moving. I will return to end the Vega line later…yes…later…”

Lionel turned and crossed the small corridor, throwing open a hidden door and revealing the treasury beyond. He removed his protective wards from the space, allowing us all entry then started barking orders at everyone to take hold of chests, bags and crates filled with his precious treasure.

I painted on my most simpering smile as I grabbed a small chest which lay beside the closest wall, waiting until his back was to me. Then I created an illusion of myself to remain in the room. Without a backwards glance, I slipped out of the door and ran.

I clutched the chest in my arms, the hard wood digging into my skin, my breaths coming in laboured pants as I headed down the next staircase; the one which led into the passages beneath the castle. The ones I had personally overseen the creation of. The ones I had prepared for this very eventuality and dreamed of every time that insufferable bastard had struck me, or cursed me, or forgotten that without me he would have had next to nothing in this war. No machinations of death, no beautiful monstrosities built of his enemies and primed to do his bidding. None of it. I had found the Burrows for him, I had delved into the depths of Gabriel Nox’s mind and prised the secrets he needed from within. Time and again he had relied on me with no praise, no reward. And what had he done with all I had created for him, all I had discovered?

He had squandered it and thanked me for nothing.

Well perhaps he should have taken more care of those whose loyalty he had demanded. Perhaps he should have realised that the dog who was punished instead of praised always bit back in the end.

I huffed and panted beneath the weight of the chest, Lionel’s scream of fury letting me know that he had discovered my deception. But I was ahead of him. He would not catch up.

I made it to the foot of the stairs, my foot snagging on the rocky ground beyond it and I fell, a cry barking from my lips as the chest flew from my arms and my face hit the rough stone.

Blood coated my cheek and forehead from the graze, pain lancing through me, and as I scrambled to my hands and knees, I found the stolen treasure littering the floor.

Footsteps were pounding down the stairs behind me. I had no time.

I grabbed a golden chalice and a handful of priceless jewellery, then ran.

Blood from my cut forehead dripped into my good eye, making me swipe at it and lose my hold on a bracelet.

I cursed, unable to spare the time to retrieve it, shoving the rest of my dwindling haul into my pocket and breaking into a sprint - though my breaths caught and wheezed with protest at the speed.

The tunnels were pitch black down here and my Faelight was flickering pathetically ahead of me so I stumbled repeatedly on the uneven ground, my hands rubbed raw from catching myself on the sharp, rock walls.

I threw a silencing bubble up behind me, hiding the noise of the king who chased after me and the demonic Heirs who no doubt hunted him in turn, before throwing myself around the last bend in the tunnels and coming face to face with the two ferocious Nymphs guarding this final point of escape.

“Open the gate! The King is coming, the war is lost, we retreat to fight another day!” I ordered.

The Nymphs surveyed me with surprise, their gleaming red eyes studying me for several too-long seconds before the larger of the two turned towards the gate, shifting back into his Fae-like form so he could unlock it.

My heart lurched as I threw myself into the most hazardous part of my plan, the shift coming over me fast, my eyes sliding together to become one and my sense of the world around me increasing.

The Nymph who was still facing me opened its mouth to make some reaction, but I had already thrown the full weight of my psychic ability at the beast, pinning him with my mental aggression and disabling him at once. The Nymphs were not practiced in mental shielding, and I had long been taking advantage of the easy access I could gain to the inner workings of their minds.

With a jerky lurch, the Nymph I had taken control of grabbed his companion and drove its jagged probes straight through his back, killing him almost instantly.

My heart thundered in my chest, the knowledge that the king approached lighting fear in my blood, but I couldn’t back down now. Too long had I been squashed beneath his thumb, too long had I pinned my hopes on his claim to the crown. It was time for me to seize my own destiny and forge a path without any master to command me.

I licked my lips eagerly, ignoring the dead Nymph as it slumped to the ground, the gate of glimmering golden metal swinging wide beyond it.

I stepped closer to the one who had fallen prey to my power and took a small knife from my pocket.

“I’m in need of a new eye,” I hissed, forcing the beast to bend low enough for me to reach its rancid face. It gave no reaction whatsoever as I carved the eye from its face, my pulse thundering with every moment I lingered, then leaping with feral joy as I took the offered organ and held it in my grasp.

I was running through the passages, then beyond, through the mountain pass, running for my life, but I was being hunted. The Vegas knew I had escaped and no matter how fast I ran, I couldn’t outpace their flames of red and blue.

I coughed violently and the scent of my own burning flesh consumed me, the vision so intense that I almost lost my hold on the Nymph.

If I ran, they would follow...but not if they thought me dead.

As soon as the idea occurred to me, I felt my fate changing like the snap of a rubber band stinging against my soul.

I was running through the passages, then beyond, through the mountain pass, running for my life, crossing a small stream, days beneath the trees without food or sign of life. Then a village appeared on the horizon, a place where no Fae would know me, a place where I could recreate myself.

I gasped as that vision abandoned me too, a ragged smile on my lips. This would work.

“Now shift,” I commanded, my voice reverberating through each piece of the Nymph’s being, the creature entirely at my mercy as it was forced to follow my every word.

The Nymph shifted and I wetted my lips with triumph as I took in his Fae-like appearance. He was around the right height and stature, making this only too easy.

With a rush of power, I thrust everything of myself into his mind, my memories, my ambitions, my wants and my fucking name. I gave it all to him, forcing him to accept it while ripping away the cords of his own memories, taking everything from him which he used to identify himself until he was nobody except me.

“What is your name?” I demanded.

“Roland Vard,” he replied, even his voice sounding like my own, though his expression was a touch vacant. I doubted anyone would realise that what with the blood pouring from his eye socket.

I shifted back into my Fae form, still maintaining my hold on him mentally, making him stand rigidly before me.

Lionel couldn’t be far now. I was running out of time. But I needed this if I wanted my fresh slate. I needed to die in this place if I wanted the world not to notice my absence.

I lifted the twitching Nymph eye like a prized trophy and placed it into my own face with a juddering sigh.

A groan rolled from my lips as the eye squirmed into position, the agony I had felt the first time this had happened no longer present, instead replaced by the thrill of the shadows welcoming me home once again.

“I missed you, my sweets,” I gasped.

The Nymph before me just watched, emotionless, expressionless.

I raised my hands and called magic to my palms, removing the wards in place on my own appearance so I could change his face into my own.

It took a matter of moments to force his features to bend to my will and I smiled triumphantly as my own face appeared before me, his hair growing to match mine, every piece of him taking on my form.

“Get dressed,” I commanded, and he did so, pulling on the set of clothes which had been stored in an alcove behind him along with weapons and a store of food and water for the duration of the watch duty.

I dropped the silencing bubble, jumping in fright as I heard the bellow of a Dragon roar far too close for my liking. Lionel was almost upon me.

“Look at me,” I snapped at the Nymph and he did so, earning himself a blast of my fire magic to the left side of his face.

He fell back with a cry of pain as I released my hold on his mind and I was pleased to see the skin surrounding his missing eye charred and burned, disguising the fresh blood.

“Forget this moment and run,” I spat at him, my hold on his mind still complete. “Head out towards the battlefield and don’t stop until someone of importance finds you.”

The Nymph said nothing, simply turning and racing away into the network of tunnels down here, hurrying towards the battlefield to find a death which would count as my own.

A flush of raw energy built in my chest at the thrill of my own brilliance, and I threw myself through the glimmering golden gate just before Lionel Acrux and his dwindling retinue of supporters rounded the corner.

The king’s furious gaze fell on me and I slammed the gate between us, snatching the key from it with a cry of terror as I found my end in the acid-green slits of his eyes.

“Open that gate at once!” he bellowed, charging for me.

Dragon fire erupted from his lips and blinded me as it filled the passageway, consuming the body of the murdered Nymph who I had left on the other side of the gate.

But not so much as a flicker of heat managed to pass through the bars which parted us. The gate had been a stunning discovery, a thing of raw magic created far before our time and left forgotten by Fae long past. I had discovered it on one of my many trips into the dark places of this world while hunting for beasts to use in my creations. It had been a simple thing to convince my oh-so-powerful king to have it installed here as a means of blocking his enemies from pursuing him should he ever have desperate need of escape. The only issue with that was the need for the key that I now held in my fist. Without it, the door would open for no one. Not even the great Dragon King and his flames.

A wide and feral smile finally spread across my face in place of the falsely subservient one I had painted there for so long.

“There was a prophecy warning of this moment,” I breathed as the flames fell away and Lionel Acrux grabbed hold of the gate, rattling it brutally and not making a shred of difference to it. “Beware the man with the painted smile,” I breathed a laugh, remembering how I had inspected that little nugget of insight from the stars after plucking it from the mind of Gabriel Nox. “The moment I heard those words, I saw this moment in my future and knew they had been intended for you.”

“Open this gate, you traitorous worm!” Lionel bellowed, the power of the gate too much for even his mighty claim to power.

I stepped closer to the golden bars, smiling my true smile at long last and breathed, “I had a vision about you and what they will call you after this day has passed.”

Lionel shook the bars and bellowed at me but I didn’t even flinch, the weight of his hold over me falling away at last.

“The Dragon who burned.”

I smiled even wider in the face of his fury and the flashes of foresight I was gifted on his behalf before turning and racing away into the dark with the sound of his continued screams chasing after me.