Chapter 3 #2
“Ethiran symbols,” the ex-acolyte explains.
“The old founders used them in some of their histories. They’re supposed to have transformative power.
There’s the scythe, and the seal.” She points to a curved mark with a straight end and a circular shape beside it.
I see the bow and the cup too, shining in the lamplight.
“You’re mixing up viatic and terrial magic? Will that work?” Damia asks skeptically.
“I figure the powers that be don’t care how we ask the question, just that we ask it loud enough,” Mal says, beckoning to Corrin. “But we’re about to find out.”
My pulse picks up now that this is really happening. Already, I think I can feel a strange haze in the air, a hum of energy rising from the circle of bloody symbols. Or is that just my fear coursing through my veins?
The shadows lurking in the corners of the chamber crawl down the walls, slithering toward the circle like eels. I gasp when I sense movement beneath my feet and watch as my own shadow coils across the floor and merges with the others.
Everyone else’s shadows remain untouched. I’m left alone, watching as the darkness in the center of the circle twists into a new shape. The form writhes and jerks—something new trying to birth itself from the shadows.
The incendi lamps flicker, and a rush of whispers flies past my ear toward the circle. Someone inhales sharply to my left, and I look over to see Corrin shaking as he holds his hands up.
“The dryads were right,” he gasps, as if trying to talk past a heavy weight on his chest. “This is dark magic.”
Damia takes a step toward Corrin, her fists tightening at her side. She feels the same fear for him that I do for Leon. She wants to stop this, but I can’t allow it.
“Hold on,” I order Corrin. Dark or not, the thrum of power in the air is unmistakable. Lafia and Mal have conjured something unique. Their spell is working.
The shadowy figure in the circle is standing now, straightening up to reveal its features.
It’s me. A me carved from purest night, but unmistakably my double. She’s unsettlingly solid, despite her shadowy limbs and face, her dark eyes blinking out at us.
“Hurry,” Mal says, handing me his knife. It’s dripping, and I realize he’s dipped it in the blood mixture.
“What do I do?” I ask, my heart thundering as I move toward the strange figure in the circle, the iron smell of my own blood filling my nose.
“You have to cut it out. You’re the one who has to take the piece of your soul—from her.”
He pushes me into the circle, and the figure turns to me, her dark eyes curious. I lift my arm, my wrist quivering. I expect her to throw up her hands to protect herself, but she just watches me.
Why do I have the strange urge to apologize for what I’m about to do?
“Now, Morgana,” Mal calls, urgency and fear echoing in his voice. I look up to see Damia holding Corrin up as sweat pours down his face. He can’t hold my proxy together much longer.
I plunge the knife into the shadow’s chest.
A scream pierces the chamber. For a moment, I think it’s the shadow, until I realize the shriek came from my lips. Pain rips through me as if I’ve driven the knife into my own heart, but when I touch my free hand to my chest, there’s no blood.
Of courses there isn’t. I haven’t cut the flesh—I’ve cut something much deeper. Something beyond flesh and bone.
The shadow Ana shrinks back from me, throwing herself toward the edge of the circle, but the symbols hold her in place. She can’t leave—she’s trapped in here with me.
“Again, Morgana,” Mal orders.
I swallow, my hand shaking worse than before. Not that it matters. This version of me can’t fight back, can only cower beneath me as I bring the blade down again.
I groan as this next wound cuts even deeper, opening up a crack inside of me that I know I must force wider. I fight every instinct begging me to stop, to end my own suffering, and slash out with the knife again.
The shadow figure is silent. She’s lying on the ground now, and my arm rises and falls automatically, stabbing at her blindly as I force myself to keep cutting despite the pain.
If this is ever going to be worth it, I can’t stop now.
I fall to my knees, sobbing as I hack away at myself.
You’re doing this for him. Leon needs this.
I chant his name to myself, praying that I’m close to the end.
That deep part of me is cleaved apart now, I can feel it.
Or rather, I can feel the yawning gap and the black emptiness rushing in to fill it.
Only a small tendril remains, a tiny part holding onto me, stubbornly resisting being severed.
I raise my arm as high as I can, a guttural cry rising in my throat.
I will find you, my love, in this world or the next.
Leon promised me something similar once. I swear the vow now as I bury my knife for the last time in my shadow self, slicing through the last thread.
The piece of my soul drifts free, leaving a rift behind. The darkness stretches inside me—endless and terrifying. It feels like it could swallow me whole, engulfing me from the inside out. For a moment, I’m afraid that’s exactly what will happen.
Then it settles, and I understand it was just finding its shape in its new home—a hole where precious soul used to be.
The shadow figure is still now, motionless on the floor in front of me. But something small floats up past my face, so faint and thin I barely spot it at first.
“That’s it,” Lafia gasps.
Mal rushes forward, lifting the bowl that carried the blood—now empty—and ushering the wisp of shadow into it with his hand.
“Take it to him,” Mal says, handing me the bowl and guiding me out of the circle.
There’s a clatter, and I realize I’ve dropped the knife.
It skitters near Corrin’s feet. The crime lord is so pale he looks like a ghost, and Damia is easing him to the ground, murmuring, “You can let go now. You did good.”
I don’t look back, so I don’t see the moment my shadow self dissipates, the darkness retreating back across the room, my real shadow returning to my feet. Instead, I focus on taking the bowl with both hands and letting myself be led to Leon’s chamber.
“Put it to his lips,” Mal instructs as we reach Leon’s side.
“You want him to drink it?” Alastor asks incredulously. Most of them have followed us inside.
“To breathe it in,” Lafia corrects.
I cup the back of Leon’s head, raising it. His chest is still rising and falling, and when I part his lips against the edge of the bowl, I feel the slight gust of an exhale. I tilt the bowl and watch as his next inhale draws the wisp of shadow in between his teeth.
Mal places a hand over Leon’s mouth, presumably to make sure the piece of soul actually stays there. I blink up at him, confused.
“Is that it?”
He shakes his head. “No. Well, maybe? I don’t know. What do you feel?”
Lafia touches my arm. “The blood spell should’ve helped thin the barrier blocking your connection. It’s up to Leon to follow the mooring back to his body now, but that piece of soul is still part of you, Ana. Try to find it.”
Find it, and I’ll find him.
I close my eyes, reaching out across the connection, searching for some answer I didn’t get before. Even if I can’t sense Leon, I should be able to sense myself.
When I brush against it, my whole body comes alive—my muscles tightening, my magic flooding into my veins.
I can feel it, and I can feel something firmly attached to it too.
That presence is solid as mountain stone and fierce as an earthquake, yet it cradles my outstretched awareness like a safe, warm burrow.
That presence—that soul—could belong to no one else.
Leon.
I wrap myself around it and pull, calling him home.