Chapter 36
Chapter 36
I do the only thing I can.
Remaining crouched to the ashen ground with Galeia pressed to my right side, I reach back with my left hand and draw my hammer.
Power surges through me, my light gleaming through the shadows, throwing my surroundings into sharp relief.
The ash looks like flecks of gold swirling across the landscape. The outlines of the monsters in the distance become clearer, giant bears, wolves, and stags clashing and tearing each other apart—until my light reaches them.
And then they stop, dropping to the ground and turning in my direction.
The figure gliding toward me is bathed in brilliance, her features more beautiful than any I’ve ever seen, her form swathed in silver silks, her pale hair flowing in the wind, every step she takes making her seem oblivious of the danger around her.
I’m filled with horror, a terrible, shattering fear, because saints help me…
I know who she is.
“Take control,” she whispers. “Take the power you want. Banish the dark, punish the wicked, and make the world as you want it to be.”
My heart pounds, but my blood is running cold as the shadow-woman smiles, and her voice slithers around me like chains tightening with every heartbeat. “Let go of your limits.”
A denial slips past my lips, drowned in the fury of the wind and Galeia’s screams.
My grip on my hammer loosens, and I leave it in its scabbard because my one choice—to fight back—is not a choice at all.
Tamra warned me that this darkness wants me dead.
Thaden warned me that using my magic would only feed the blight. Even the nameless woman who was watching over Galeia warned me that dark magic only serves itself.
It brought me here, and I have no choices.
None at all.
Because, if this darkness claims my power, it will be unstoppable.
A scream rises to my lips, a snarl as fierce as a beast. “I will never be you!”
“Oh, but you will, Asha,” the shadow-woman says, her serene smile gleaming ever brighter with every step she takes. “There is no darkness you won’t embrace to save the ones you love.”
I’m frozen, rendered still where I crouch with no way out.
No way at all.
“Do it,” she whispers more forcefully than before. “Use your hammer. Fill this ash with power. Bring the dead to life. Wake… everything .”
Her smile grows, and her eyes gleam. “All will bow to you. Every creature, living and dead, will revere?—”
She stops speaking abruptly, her focus on something behind me. A snarl rises to her lips, the smile drops from her face, her beauty slips, and dark cracks suddenly appear across her skin.
I don’t dare take my eyes off her, but at the corner of my vision, there’s a light, and it’s getting brighter. Fast.
A high-pitched hum comes with it, the kind that’s made by something moving so quickly through the air that it’s defying the laws of nature.
It happens so fast that I have no time to prepare.
A bright orb shoots across the space between me and the shadow-woman before it crashes into the ground.
The moment it hits, it explodes.
Heat and light and fire ripple out from the impact point, a wildfire raging toward me and there’s nothing I can do to get out of its path.
For a heartbeat, I’m surrounded by an impossible silence, and then the explosion reaches me.
The impact knocks me backward so hard that I gain air, my arms closing ever more tightly around Galeia, whose screams have suddenly stopped.
For two more heartbeats, I’m suspended in the air, caught in the force rippling out from the impact point.
There’s a crater in the ground, filled with a raging fire so bright, my own light pales in comparison. I could be looking at a thousand stars all exploding at once.
Within the circle of light is a girl.
She can’t be more than ten years old, dressed in white, her hair as pale as the moon, and her skin paler. So pale, she’s almost translucent. Luminous. Nothing but light.
Opposite her, the shadow-woman was thrown into the air, just as I was.
The girl punches her right hand forward, light spearing from her palm, slicing right through the shadow-woman’s screaming, splintering form.
And then she’s nothing more than splashes of dark light shrieking across the air.
The girl turns, racing toward me.
Her feet are bare. Of all the things I could notice at that moment, it seems the least important, but my head is buzzing, and my thoughts are wooly.
She’s screaming something at me.
I don’t have a hope of understanding her because now I’m falling.
The ground rears up at me, but the girl is leaping toward me, her hand outstretched, her body flying through the air, and right before her hand brushes mine, I’m certain of the command on her lips.
Jump!
My feet barely touch the ground before I reach deep for control and compel every muscle in my body to obey, throwing myself upward.
A split second later, a feathery body appears beneath me, flying low to the ground. At the exact same moment, the girl’s hand closes around mine. She flips herself around behind me, and we both land safely on the bird’s back, and then we’re rising into the air.
I can’t process it all at once.
My mind is only now catching up with my body as I register Blackbird’s frantic wing beats. The lightning sizzling through his body. The panic in his flight. The way the girl leans out to the side, punching her hand out again, spearing light across our path head, separating the shadows even as they try to close in around us, and then?—
We soar into clear air.
Oh, it’s dank and copper-filled and reeks of death, but it’s practically sweet compared to the suffocating darkness that looms so close behind us.
I don’t understand what just happened—or who the girl who crashed into us is—but my concern now is for Galeia.
She’s limp in my arms, her little limbs loose. Her head would be lolling if I weren’t supporting her.
“Galeia?” I can’t tell if she’s breathing. It’s all I can do to stay secure on Blackbird’s back while we’re moving so fast. “Galeia!”
She gives no response.
No, no, no…
“Galeia!”
In the next heartbeat, I detect the smallest rise and fall of her chest.
“She’s alive.” I can’t stop my sob of relief, but it’s short-lived. Galeia might be alive, but she isn’t conscious, and the longer she remains that way, the more worrying it will be. “I don’t know what’s wrong.”
“My magic hurt her.” The girl speaks behind me. “I’m sorry. She is dark magic, and I… am something else.”
I don’t have time to wonder what ‘something else’ could be. This girl certainly came out of nowhere, and her power is immense, but I’ll figure out what her ‘something else’ is later.
“We have to set down,” I say. “I need to know where she’s hurt and figure out how to help her.”
“We must not land,” the girl replies firmly. “We must fly straight and true to my home in the west?—”
“The west is hours away!” I can’t turn to the girl, or I’ll upset my precarious balance, but I need her to understand how worried I am. “Galeia can’t wait that long.”
“Galeia?” The girl’s voice is soft but carries a clear note of curiosity. “That is an unusual name for such a dark creature.”
“She isn’t a creature,” I snap. “She’s a person, and she’s very important to me.”
How did that become so true so quickly? How did Galeia burrow her way into my heart in such a short time?
Blackbird’s ears are pricked. He’s clearly listening to what we’re saying, but for now, there’s an extended silence behind me.
No immediate retort from the girl.
Then she leans forward, reaching past me to point into the distance.
“Do you see the thunderbirds up ahead? The fae have spread their defenses wide. We must evade them at all costs. Even if you weren’t already their enemy, this child is Darkness . They will sense her nature and attack you on sight.
“That means we have two choices. We must either head due west along that mountain ridge where they do not yet patrol, or we must turn sharply north, circle around them, and then travel down along the coastline.”
If we travel west from here, we’ll fly through the airspace above human territory. They’re allied with the dragons, who will also no doubt carry out air patrols, and most likely react even more badly to Galeia’s presence.
But if we go north first…
My eyes widen. The deep north belongs to the Einherjar and the Valkyries. They are Galeia’s people. Her mother lives in that direction. She told me to protect Thaden, so I assume she will want to protect her daughter, too.
Even if we don’t reach her, the north is still far safer for Galeia than the west.
But first, I need to know more about the girl’s intentions. She got us out away from the blight and Blackbird clearly trusts her—even if I have no idea how they crossed each other’s paths. I don’t want to dismiss the possibility that she has good reasons for wanting to take us directly west.
“Why do you want me to come to your home?” I ask.
“Because that is where the end begins,” she replies.
“The end of what?” I ask, my heart suddenly beating harder.
“The end of the beginning.”
Too fucking cryptic.
“We fly north,” I declare. “Blackbird? Do you understand?”
He shows me that he does when he banks steeply to the right.
The sun is setting up ahead, but the natural darkness will help us stay hidden. We’ve already traveled far enough toward the west that Thaden’s village is a mere speck in the east, although the dark plain is still very visible.
On our other side, to my left, I can make out the heaviest concentration of thunderbirds, their lightning flickering through the air, as well as the castle where Queen Karasi is situated.
But the white-haired girl was right. The path we’re taking right now sits cleanly between the two.
She gives a loud sigh at my choice, but then she points toward the east—a final look back. “Do you see the edge of the dark plain? It has spread farther west even in the last day. Now my magic has fed it even more.”
My forehead creases. “Your magic pushed it back.”
“No, Asha,” she says so quietly that I nearly don’t hear her. “I’ve made it worse. Saving you was my only purpose.”
I risk another glance back—a final glance. Even from this distance, it’s clear that blight has extended farther along the wide plain.
The girl clears her throat. “It will spread even faster now, and the fae will become desperate soon. They will push west, and the humans will go to war.”
I wish I could deny the girl’s prediction, but Tamra described to me how badly the fae are hurting. I’m certain Queen Karasi will only act in her own best interests, but she won’t let the blight reach what remains of her people. After all, she can’t be a queen without people to rule over.
I wish I could ask Blackbird where Erik is. The last I saw of them both, Erik was leaping off Blackbird’s back onto Graviter Rex’s neck. They must have been separated somehow…
My heartbeat quickens at the possibility that Erik’s in trouble.
With my heart in my throat, I monitor Galeia’s breathing—shallow but constant. The ground beneath us is rocky and sharp, impossible to land on, and I pray we reach a safe spot soon.
As the air becomes colder, I fight off the chill, shivering in my tunic and pants and trying to keep Galeia warm, too.
I don’t mind when the girl presses in behind me, but she seems to be doing it more for my benefit than hers. She isn’t shivering at all despite wearing nothing more than a dress. Actually, I’m not even certain how she’s keeping it from flying up in her face. Still, the darker it gets, the warmer she gets.
“What should I call you?” I call back to her, my teeth chattering.
“In my original tongue, I am called Caoilainn Liadan .”
I try to repeat it, but it’s nearly impossible while I’m shivering. “C-C-C…”
“How about you call me Cailey ,” she says, seeming to pick some of the most prominent sounds from her name and piecing them together.
I give her a nod, and that is all before I concentrate on staying alive.
Finally, I spot firelight ahead, along with the outline of a wall that appears to surround a gathering of buildings.
It looks quiet, with only a few silhouettes of people patrolling the wall.
I don’t imagine that our welcome will be warm, but I’m prepared to invoke General Glass’s name if I have to. The Einherjar may be savage, but they revere the Valkyries. I’m certain they won’t risk harming the child of one.
“Down there,” I say to Blackbird. Finally . “On the flat land next to those rocks. We can set down and?—”
A sudden gust of wind rushes up around us, coming out of nowhere, its force snatching the words from my mouth. At the same time, an enormous, scaled body shoots into the air right in front of us.
I don’t have time to wonder how we didn’t see it.
Blackbird shrieks and attempts to evade it, but the new beast knocks into us.
I catch a glimpse of fierce reptilian eyes and crimson scales and then we’re tumbling toward the ground.