Chapter 3
Three
Avalon
“My impartiality is hanging by a thread, Avalon Halhed, Ninth Daughter of the Ninth Line.”
I’d been shot. I remembered the pain, the feel of the blood leaving my body like a geyser. I remembered the sound of nothing as my heart and body stopped.
Now? I felt weightless and warm. Happy in a way that rarely happened outside of stolen moments with my guys.
Something was not quite right.
Forcing my eyes open, I looked up into the face of a beautiful woman. She looked so familiar, like I’d passed her in the street at some point—though she didn’t seem like someone you’d forget—but also completely alien to me. She felt… big.
Maybe blood loss had impaired my brain? I tried to look past her, but everything was hazy. Some part of me knew that if I wasn’t dead, I was really close.
“I’m sorry?” My voice was rough.
The woman’s face softened. “I know you are. You must go back, Avalon. I cannot send you back; I’ve interfered enough. You have enough lifeforce left to reset this moment, and you must. If you die here, everyone you love will follow you. Ebrus will follow you.”
I sighed heavily, my eyes closing. “I’m tired.”
A soft hand reached out and stroked my cheek. “I know, my champion. So strong—that’s why you were chosen. However, you can’t let it end here. You must fight.”
With a huff, I opened my eyes again. “Okay. For them.”
She smiled this time, and it was like the dawn rising on a new day. Beautiful. “For them. For you.” She placed a hand on my chest, over the gaping hole still steadily bleeding. Outside this dreamy bubble, there were roars and trumpets, but here, it was perfectly calm. “Go back, Avalon.”
Those softly murmured words, filled with comfort and wisdom and kindness, stroked through my memories. Memories of her holding me, my crying body exhausted and limp. But she seemed so much bigger. Or maybe I was smaller.
I gave her a crooked smile. “Okay, Goddess.” I reached into that flickering place inside me, that held my magic, or maybe my lifeforce, and gripped it with two hands.
On a scream, I pushed it outward, sending us back.
The Goddess in front of me faded away, but her voice followed me. “This is your eighth life, Avalon Halhed. Use it wisely.”
Before
I sucked in a deep breath, Kian’s arms around my shoulders. “I’ve been worried about you,” his gruff voice said against my hair, and I froze. The forest noises played around us, but I was unsettled.
I knew this feeling. This hollowness in my chest. I stepped away and rubbed my sternum. There was an ache there, like someone had punched a hole in my chest, that hadn’t been there a moment ago.
Something niggled in the back of my brain. Stepping away from Kian, I looked at Lierick. “Get the book.”
Despite his shock, he didn’t hesitate, leaping over a log to where our bags were stored beside Celis and Powell, and grabbing out our copy of A Future History of Ebrus.
Bound in a waterproof wrap, spelled with elemental magic, thanks to Vox, the book could have floated its way across the Alutian Sea, and not a single page would curl.
Freeing it carefully, Lierick skimmed to the last page, and his shoulders stiffened.
“Read it for the rest of us,” Hayle growled.
Lierick cleared his throat. I could see the slight paleness to his skin, the only indicator that it had been bad.
I mean, every time had been bad; it was why I kept resetting.
“We separate here from Kian, and head to Rewill. Avalon’s father was meant to be away, but instead, he was meeting with the Baron of the First Line.
” My eyes moved to Vox, whose jaw was tense.
“Vox is stabbed, and we’re captured in a warded room.
Avalon’s old room.” Looking up at Kian, he chewed his lip.
“He threatens to kill Bach, saying he only needs one Heir.”
Sucking in a deep breath, he continued. “Then Bach rescues us, and Vox nearly kills your father, but succumbs to his wounds. He’s dying, and we flee, but run right into a regiment of First Line soldiers and Feodore Vylan himself.
” He looked at me, his eyes haunted. “He shoots you, and you reset while in the hands of death.”
I felt the ghost of a memory brush across my mind, like a hand across my cheek. Was that death?
A shaking breath flowed from my throat. I couldn’t dwell on it.
I moved toward Vox, wrapping him in my arms, my cheek to his chest so I could count his heartbeats.
Despite everything, I was so thankful for my magic, for the gift of being able to change the weave of destiny.
Even if it meant that the chance of a simple life was never going to be mine.
“I’m okay, love,” Vox whispered against my hair.
Not loosening my hold on him, I nodded. “I just need to hold you a little longer.”
No one spoke, until finally, I remembered the two strangers in our midst. Fuck.
We looked over at Celis and Powell, who were gaping at us, wide-eyed.
“Uh, Kian, this is Powell, the youngest son of the Baron of the Fifth Line and his… friend, Celis.” I gave him a quick rundown of how we’d rescued them, including Yaron’s death.
Despite being as vague as possible about what had happened to them, it was enough to set Kian’s jaw pulsing with rage. Everyone knew about Yaron Vylan. No one would be sad that he was dead. There would be no country-wide day of mourning for that piece of shit.
“They need a healer, then they need to disappear until this is all over,” I finished.
Kian nodded. “I know a place.” He hesitated. “I found it once, by accident. I don’t believe Father even knows it’s there. The girl—Celis”—he corrected himself—“can get healing there. If Feodore Vylan is haunting the plains, then perhaps it’s best if your group comes with us.”
I looked around at the guys, the echoes of our past life haunting us. Lierick and Iker seemed to be having a silent argument, though I wasn’t sure about what. Finally, Iker stood and stomped into the woods.
Lierick’s expression was closed, and it was only because I knew him a little that I could see that he was perturbed by what he was about to say. “They can’t know about you.”
My eyes slid to Powell and Celis, understanding sliding through me like insidious fingers. He had to wipe their memory of the book, of the knowledge that I could reset time, in case they were captured.
It seemed necessary, but we would be in their last safe place: their minds.
Revulsion shook me to my core, but if they were captured by the First Line, they could sink this revolution before it had even begun.
Sucking in a deep breath, I walked toward them.
Squatting down in front of Celis, I chewed my lip.
“What you heard before is a secret so big that it has the potential not only to end my life, but the lives of everyone I love. To destroy Ebrus. Lierick wants to remove it from your memory. He’ll smooth over just those few moments. ”
“What?” Celis breathed.
“He’s going to bury himself in our brains and remove the memories,” Powell grunted. “I don’t want that. I won’t say anything.” He folded his arms across his chest, but he looked moments away from fighting, if Lierick came any closer.
Celis was quiet. “Can he… Can he take more? Can he remove the memories of…” She trailed off, and I looked up at Lierick.
With a solemn expression, he nodded. “I can… blur them. I can’t remove them completely, but I can make it all seem like a bad dream that you can’t quite remember. The memories themselves are too old, too ingrained into the survivor you are now.”
Celis didn’t hesitate. “Do it. I don’t want to remember.”
“Celis—” Powell argued, and she cut him a look. His mouth snapped shut, and I had to respect that.
Lierick sat before her, his fingers light on her temples, holding her head still. He worked quietly, only the gentle brush of strong magic against my skin letting me know he was doing anything at all.
Finally, her shoulders dropped. Her jaw relaxed. I hadn’t realized how tightly she was holding herself until her demons released their claws. A shuddering sigh of relief. The unclenching of fingers. They were all signs that this was the right thing.
Lierick was pale and vibrating, like he’d drawn all her tension inside himself. I didn’t need to know what he’d seen as he extracted those memories from Celis. I wouldn’t even want to imagine, but I could take some educated guesses at the horrors.
Powell watched her closely, but when Lierick turned to him, he narrowed his eyes. “I owe you my life. My loyalty. But I can’t let you do this to me. I can’t—” He let out a broken noise, and I was shaking my head, putting my hand on Lierick’s arm, stilling him.
“Okay, Powell.” I looked at Lierick. “Enough has been taken. I believe him.”
Lierick looked like he wanted to argue, but I stood firm. Powell needed to be in control of something, and this was a small thing I could give him.
I shook my head. “Let’s go. We’re sitting ducks out here, if Feodore Vylan is roaming the plains this close to the Ninth Line Barony.”
Kian watched me closely, and the childish urge to let my older brother take care of everything washed over me.
For so many years, I’d relied on Kian for everything—for survival during most of my childhood, but later, for more than that.
For love and approval. To know what was right and wrong.
I had become the person I was, because of Kian.
He’d only brought two more horses, aside from his own.
Glory was a sweet mare, and the other one must have been a new acquisition, because I’d never seen her before.
No doubt she had some kind of cloud name, because my brother loved meteorology.
It was a weird hobby, but knowing whether we were going to get four feet of snow just by the shape of the clouds on the horizon was the difference between life and death up here. He’d learned early and fallen in love.
I envied his passion for something so innocuous.
“Do you ride?” Kian asked the two strangers in our group. It was the first time he’d spoken to them directly, and Celis jolted a little.
Powell hesitated. “Not well.”
Celis hesitated. “I do. But I’m not sure I could handle them with my feet.”
Kian’s eyes dropped to her bandaged feet, and it was only from years of reading my brother’s microexpressions did I know he was raging inside at her injuries.
He cleared his throat. “Powell can ride with me. Nimbus is large enough to carry us both, if we don’t ride hard.
Is there anyone you feel comfortable riding with?
” Once again, he directed the question at Celis.
He didn’t assume. Didn’t force his opinion on her.
I loved my brother.
She wet her lower lip nervously. “Iker has been carrying me,” she whispered softly, although Iker hadn’t reappeared from the woods. I knew he would. He might have disagreed with his cousin, but he loved Lierick. He’d never leave him unprotected.
“You four?” he asked me and my guys, and Hayle shrugged.
“I’ll run with the hounds.”
Vox looked at me. “I can use my magic.”
I grinned up at Lierick. “Looks like it’s you and me.”
“Hours spent with your body pressed against my chest sounds like heaven,” he murmured back quietly, and Kian let out a gagging noise.
“Hands to yourself. That’s my baby sister.”
Iker reappeared from the woods, saying something softly to Celis before climbing into the saddle of Glory, then reaching down to hoist Celis up behind him. She settled easily, already seeming lighter.
I hopped up on the new horse, a gray mare apparently named Stratus. My brother was nothing if not consistent. Lierick climbed up behind me, settling me almost into his lap as he gripped the reins.
We set out west, away from Rewill. Away from the home I knew deep in my soul that I’d never see again.