28. Hope is Never Dead
CHAPTER 28
Hope is Never Dead
ALIA
I bowed my head over Ran’s mane and breathed her in. I ran my fingers along her horn, felt her soft whiskers, and basked in her scent of freedom and oakwood and lemon one last time.
I gently lifted her head from my lap and slid out from under her. I placed a final kiss against her soft muzzle. I ignored the rending of my soul as the bond I loved passed from this body.
“ In saecula saeculorum, amare,” I whispered, closing her glassy eyes.
My shoulders shook. My body ached. My fists clenched. Someone had killed my bond. And they would pay.
My shoulders bowed, but they were as taut as the strings of a fully drawn bow. “Who?” I said almost under my breath. Then I shouted, “ WHO?”
There was a commotion behind me. Shouting, a grunt, then a body hitting the ground. I turned to see a man on his side, sneering.
“It was just a unicorn,” he said, hacking up phlegm as he rose to his knees.
I smiled, a parting of the lips that was both a snarl of pure loathing and the amusement of a master predator. Within four strides, I was before him. I felt his need to prove himself as the younger sibling of the youngest sibling.
“You”—I looked him up and down—“are nothing. You’re a lost cause, broken by the very system you strove so hard to impress. But you always lacked a little something, didn’t you? First, it was in childhood. Your brother was always better, getting the attention and the praise. You just wanted it. Just a bit, and you would’ve been happy. But then your brother stole your dream to become a Red, didn’t he? And he was so much better than you. You had to cheat on your last test merely to pass while he was first in the ranks and became the Head Enforcer within five years. What did you hope to prove by killing me? That you could?” My laugh was low and humorless as I watched his face become increasingly pale. “Anyone can kill. It takes a man to rebuild what was broken. And I’m more of a man than you’ll ever be.”
He trembled in his shackled bonds, but that didn’t stop him from trying to get at me. He leapt upright and charged. I stepped aside and kicked him in the butt.
He face-planted, eating dirt. I shoved his head into a pile of manure, leaning down to whisper, “That unicorn was my best friend and a creature with feelings, emotions, hopes, and dreams just like the rest of us. She knew sacrifice. She knew love. What do you know of these?”
I rose, spitting on the ground beside him.
I reached for my blade.
A hand touched my arm. I whirled around, my dagger at the throat of the person before they blinked. I met eyes of pure red.
“If you need to kill, I am your dagger,” he said, those blood-red eyes searching my face. “But do not bloody your pure soul with an execution. Do not become the monster you defeated.”
I slowly lowered my blade. “I already am,” I said.
I turned to face my Reds. “This ends today. The killing, the murders, the pain. We are no longer assassins of magic, but protectors of life itself.”
Elder Timone was the first to step up to me. He took a knee before me. “ May matriarch vivunt longum et bene,” he said, striking his hand against his chest.
Mom and Dad were next, along with the other elders. Head Enforcer Markus made my grandma get down on her knees before me. “ May matriarch vivunt longum et bene,” they said, excluding my grandma, of course, who said nothing.
Then the fully-fledged Reds in their hoods bent a knee in four rows of ten with the trainees behind them. “ May matriarch vivunt longum et bene.”
At last the people themselves, those of the entire village, bowed before me.
“ May matriarch vivunt longum et bene.”
“May the matriarch live long and prosper,” Shen said, getting down on a knee beside me.
“Rise,” I said. “We were lied to by our leaders. By those we trusted.” I waved Elder Pulma up. He still held the book in his hands, clutching it to his chest. “Elder Pulma, would you please?”
He nodded, slowly opening the page.
It was in the language of old, but for the sake of the children, he translated it.
“Thus is the honor and the living might of the force known as the Red Knights of the order of Spero, spurned to form by the death of the great Nymph Queen Eledira, who gave her life so we humans could escape the Dark Mage Jilhishad. In and by her honor, we are to defend the weak, mend the broken, mourn with the mourning, and uphold the defenseless. We are an order deigned by Source and honored by the One True King to stand against the evils of this world in all its forms, from the darkest mage to the vilest human. For the Gift does not define good nor evil. It is what one chooses to become that defines the soul. Thus we choose our banner:
“Power ab intus, tutela omnium.
Choices sunt potentiae quaeramus.
Damnum potestate sui exitium honoris.
Honor sui, honor arbitrium, honor Vita Fons, honor Auctorem, honor Vita.
Tutela omnium, fides tribui, vita magicis.”
Elder Pulma cleared his throat, then spoke the Banner of the Reds in common.
“Power from within, protection for all.
Choices are the power we seek.
The loss of this power is the destruction of honor.
Honor self, honor choice, honor Source, honor Creator, honor life.
Protection over all, loyalty to tribe, life to magic.”
How far we have fallen from what we were supposed to be. I hung my head, wondering what we could ever do to make up for the evil we had wrought upon the face of this earth.
“You will condemn us all,” Grandma said, her voice trembling, her eyes pale with rage and fear. Never had I seen my grandma so small. She was still kneeling, watching with horror as the scene unfolded before her.
I crouched before her, my heart aching in my chest. All I ever wanted was her love. For her to be proud of me. But I realized then that she could never provide what I needed. She was a broken creature filled with malice and heartbreak. And a broken chalice can never fill another until it is mended.
Grandma did not wish to be mended. Not now. Perhaps not ever. And I couldn’t force a mend upon her. She had to choose it.
A hole grew in my soul… one that had been there all along, though I’d never realized it. It was like an old friend, always there, always hungry. It was fed with scraps of her attention and grew with the bereavement of her absent love.
It was about time I let myself grieve the grandma I needed, as that was a grandma I never had.
It was time that I love myself as I had loved her: with grace, compassion, and gentleness, forgiving of mistakes and allowing others to bear the consequences of their own actions.
My rage dwindled as I looked down at her and felt only sorrow. Sorrow for what she could’ve been. Sorrow for what we could’ve had. And sorrow for what would never be.
“Better to die knowing you did what was right than to live with the guilt of innocent blood,” I said.
Dad grabbed Grandma’s arms and took her to her home, where she would live out her days in whatever peace she allowed. I couldn’t kill her, but I wouldn’t allow her manipulative lies to deceive my people any longer.
I was Matriarch of the Reds, and it was time to find peace.
Something nudged my soul. A gentle need .
I smiled, thinking it was Ran’s last parting gift to me. For a moment, I could feel her. My bond, as she was the very first time I met her. Whipped and alone and near death, and all she had needed was a hug. This time, though, she needed a hug I couldn’t give her.
My knees gave out. I stared at the blood-drenched sand, unseeing, my mind somewhere far away where no pain could touch me. I knew I would have to get up, get back to work, lead my people. But it felt so bleak without my best friend here to keep me straight, to tell me when I was being an idiot, or to watch the birds fly as we cuddled in our favorite clearing.
“Alia—look!" Jacob said, his voice rising at the end with a hint of fear. I glanced up, my eyes hazy from a sheen of tears.
I turned just in time to see that Ran was glowing, pulsing with a soft, warm light. Her body lifted from the ground, her horn glowing like a tiny sun.
My Reds yelled and gathered weapons as unicorns stepped from between the trees, their white, brown, and golden bodies glowing with an ethereal light.
Shen held up a hand to stay their blades. My Reds glanced from him to me. I nodded, telling them to listen, but I held up two fingers, saying to use caution as I stood, prepared to kill those Ran loved in order to protect my people.
Shock ran like cold lightning through my veins as the unicorns gathered before Ran and bowed a knee, their chins resting on the sand that had swallowed my bond’s lifeblood. I had never seen crazed unicorns so... tame.
Maybe because you've never looked, said a sweet, sweet voice in my mind.
"Ran?" I whispered, my lips numb and my knees weak. I took a step forward, but my legs almost didn’t hold me. Shen was there, holding me upright, but I didn’t—I couldn’t acknowledge him.
I glanced up at the white light, and I had to shield myself from it as it grew to rival the sun. Then it was gone.
I blinked away the lingering black spots and—and—Had I passed out? Was this all a broken dream my subconscious provided to prevent me from losing it? Was it all?—
Stop talking yourself into insanity, she said with an imperial snort.
I ran.
The unicorns who could disembowel me with their horns didn't even cross my mind as I darted between them to the being in the center. My heart leapt up to my throat as I slowed, staring at the beauty and majesty of the creature before me.
She slowly rose, getting her feet beneath her and stretching her wings out to the sides. She shook them a few times, then folded them down so they wouldn't hit the surrounding creatures.
Hello, Two-Legs, she said, her voice knowing and sassy, yet a sweet melody to my mind. Her voice became wry and mischievous as she dipped her head toward me, her warm brown eyes nearly glowing with happiness. Did I surprise you?
My laugh was broken by a whimper, and I face-planted into her scales. Her wings came forward and her trail wrapped around me as she cocooned me in a warm embrace. My body shook as sobs rose from deep in my chest to wash the plains of her scales.
My bond. My friend. My sister.
Alive? And a blasted dragon ?
I will tell all later, Two-Legs. For now, know I was cursed into that form and the Sacrifice of True Love set me free. I had to die before I could live again in this body, Alia. I’m so sorry I couldn’t tell you sooner, but I did try to warn you. You were just too much of an idiot to realize it.
I choked on a laugh and hugged her tighter before I pulled back with a smile, my eyes still watering. I cradled her huge cheek in my hand, kissing her nose that twitched between velveteen whiskers.
My heart was overwhelmingly happy. My soul felt like everything would be ok. My bondmate of a sister was here. My werewolf was here. My family was here.
The Black Mages would quake with fear.
The Matriarch of the Reds was coming for them.
And now she had a dragon.