Chapter Thirty-three
The Soulreaper glides towards us. Her unmistakable yellow-blonde curls frame her face like thorny brambles, and her presence feels like a stain, a darkness seeping into the very fabric of the air around us.
“My darling boy,” Madame Vera says, hands outstretched. Next to me, I can feel something shift in Taron as a change overtakes him.
“I knew you wouldn’t let me down. And you…” A wicked smirk adorns her lips as she looks at me. “You have great promise.”
My fists clench involuntarily. The impulse to scream is overwhelming, but I suppress it. This woman took everything from me – my sister, my home, my life. And here I am helping her.
I look at Taron, but he averts his eyes. All at once, the energy emanating from him dissipates, like a turtle retreating into its shell. I sense something different about him, a change in his stance and the way he carries himself.
His face becomes a mask, every muscle frozen, posture rigid. It’s as if Madame Vera’s mere presence has somehow cut him down, leaving behind only a shadow of the boy I’ve come to know.
Seeing him like this is reminiscent of our first encounter in the parlour – a stoic young man ensnared in Madame Vera’s web, devoid of independent thought. I see now the extent of her hold over him.
Madame Vera turns to face the Astrals. She spreads her arms wide. “Here I am again, after all these years,” she announces. “I can’t tell you how good it feels to be back.”
“You have a lot of nerve,” the Astral in green remarks with disdain.
Madame Vera’s smile is bright, almost deceivingly kind. She doesn’t have the face of someone with wicked intentions, which I suppose makes her all the more dangerous.
“On the contrary,” she says, “I can’t imagine a more fitting return. I’m here to finish what I started all those years ago.”
“Why resurrect that tyrant?” asks the monocled man.
Madame Vera’s shoulders stiffen. A subtle tremor runs through her as anger bleeds into every rigid line of her posture. Her veneer of pleasantry splinters, finally revealing the malice beneath.
“Why not?” she sneers. “The amulet is rightfully his. It belongs to my family, yet you dared to steal it and send us into exile. I say, no more. Today, the time has come for the Halo bloodline to reclaim what is ours.”
“You’ve failed to do so once before,” says the Astral in blue.
“Indeed, but I was young and foolish then. I didn’t play by the rules of the game. I stole the wish and it cost me dearly. You can’t touch me now, because the wish is rightfully mine. Am I wrong?”
The Astrals’ faces are written with disgust. I half-expect them to rush forward to apprehend her. Defend the temple or block her from accessing the amulet, but they stand motionless, rooted in the shade of the tree.
She must be right about them being bound to the rules of the tournament.
Madame Vera strokes Taron’s cheek as she halts beside him, her lips murmuring a soft, “Well done, my dear.”
I can’t stand the sight of it.
“No need for formalities,” she continues, looking around. “How do we do this? Do they simply pass me the amulet?”
“That’s how it works, yes,” says the Astral in blue, turning towards Taron and me and adding in a quiet voice, “Please, don’t do this. You can still reconsider.”
A shadow of alarm touches the Astral’s otherwise placid face, and I hesitate.
“Resurrecting that tyrant would mean the end of our kingdom as we know it,” says the monocled man, still addressing Madame Vera.
“You may be of his blood, but he won’t care about you.
He is callous and cunning. Selfish beyond comprehension.
The power he gained from the amulet smothered any thread of humanity he had left in him. ”
“He was a god, and you feared him!” Madame Vera’s face is all lines and teeth now, flushed an angry red.
“He inspired devotion so fierce his followers would have scorched the earth in his name. Your precious High Council can’t dream of commanding such unwavering loyalty.
All they do is send their youth to slaughter and disguise it as tradition. Yet no one holds them to account.”
“The High Council isn’t perfect by any means.” The monocled man calmly adjusts his eyepiece. “But Valerius never built loyalty. He bought it. And anyone who refused his price was oppressed or killed.”
“Enough!” Madame Vera pivots towards Taron and me. “They’re stalling. Please, my darlings, we must complete the transfer at once.”
A tight coil unspools in my stomach. Maybe this is a mistake. I convinced myself to wash my hands of whatever happens. That if the Astrals had stopped Madame Vera from resurrecting Valerius once, they could do it again.
I didn’t realize they were tethered to the rules of the tournament in this way. And that the only reason they were free to stop Madame Vera before was because she stole the wish. It wasn’t hers to make.
“What are you waiting for, girl?” Madame Vera hisses.
I look at Taron. A glazed look has spread over his face. I am overcome by a quiet wretchedness, a despairing realization – she’s got her fingers whorled around his mind.
“I should’ve listened to you,” I whisper, and my heart aches to see that annoying, satisfied smirk of his. It never comes.
I can’t do this. She’s a monster. What am I thinking? My breath seems to have solidified in my throat, in my bones, preventing them from moving. Then…
“Talia?”
My blood chills. That voice. So soft. So painfully familiar, it might as well be my own. I look around the temple, trying to locate where it’s coming from.
The Necroseals on Madame Vera’s fingers pulse faintly. She weaves her hand through the air beside her, fingers pinched as though pulling an invisible thread.
An impression starts to form. A white haze, taking on the shape of a person.
A girl with delicate features.
She’s slender with soft shoulders. Dainty wrists. The cloudy manifestation doesn’t show the colour of her eyes, but I’ve gazed upon them too many times in my life to not know they’re blue.
“E-Elara?” My voice is small. Broken. It must be her spirit. I’ve heard of Soulreapers calling forth spirits from the afterlife, allowing them to interact with the living.
“Talia, what’s going on?” The hazy Elara sounds far away, like she’s submerged under water. “I don’t feel quite myself…”
An exultant hot tear trickles across my cheek. “Are you doing this to taunt me?” I sneer at Madame Vera.
“I’m only reminding you, dear, why you’re doing this.”
“Talia, I’m so cold…” Elara sounds hurt and confused. I can’t stand it.
I flee forward with my arms open, ready to embrace her spectral form. Madame Vera snaps her fingers and, with another pulse of her Necroseals, Elara vanishes. My arms wrap around a cloud of white mist, and then I’m embracing only myself.
She’s gone. Again.
It’s somehow worse, losing her a second time.
A devastating ache explodes in my chest, taking my breath away.
I stand frozen, feeling not entirely connected to my body.
The world feels cracked sideways. Time feels split open.
I’m only watching from afar, consciousness drifting as I turn to face Madame Vera.
She steps aside, and Taron, too, allowing me to approach the statue of Aether.
Suddenly, the light is too sharp and the colours too loud, and nothing matters. I don’t care about the Astrals, their voices a distant echo as they repeatedly urge me to reconsider.
“You must look beyond your personal grief,” I hear the monocled man, somewhere at the back of my head. “Think of the kingdom. The countless lives that have already been lost at the hands of this monstrous woman.”
There’s only one life that matters to me. I want my sister back.
I reach for the amulet around the statue’s neck. The crystal’s pulse intensifies when I touch it, taking the gold chain in my hands and hoisting it over Aether’s head.
You would never think this jewel, glittering with various shades of ginger, ochre and saffron, with specks of red scattered throughout, was once a star that fell from the sky. I lay the amulet flat on my palm, and the crystal nestled within flickers in response.
My jaw is clenched so hard it aches. Despite the roaring heat in my veins, I still have to physically force myself to place the amulet in Madame Vera’s outstretched hand. But I do it. Because Elara’s life hangs in the balance.
The Soulreaper’s greedy fingers close around the amulet, and the Astrals release a collective sigh of disappointment.
“There, you got what you wanted,” I say. “You got your wish, now give me back my sister.”
“Oh, just a moment, dear child. I’m a little preoccupied,” Madame Vera croons as she cradles the amulet.
When she attempts to brush me off with a wave of her hand, I stand my ground.
She pushes me again, more firmly this time, and I watch her mutter to the amulet, as if asking it something.
The star responds with a sound too soft to hear.
The yellowish glow emanating from it brightens, and then it dims again.
With a satisfied sigh, Madame Vera straightens and smiles at everyone. “Well, what a successful day indeed,” she declares. “I apologize for cutting this lovely gathering short, but I must be off now. Taron, are you ready to go?”
“You promised you’d bring back my sister,” I say, reaching out and gripping her forearm. “So, where is she?”
Madame Vera looks down at me disdainfully. “Please, dear, compose yourself. You reek of desperation.”
“Talia,” says Taron, more hushed and reserved than I ever thought he was capable of, “please, don’t—”
I cut him off. “What about our deal?”
“Oh, that? My apologies,” Madame Vera says. “I really shouldn’t have gotten your hopes up. Your poor little sister is gone. I’d move on if I were you. It’s not healthy to dwell on the past.”
I feel dizzy as the world around me spirals. Taron’s words float to the surface of my mind.
She won’t give you your sister back, Talia. I know her. She lies and cheats. Her word means nothing.