CHAPTER 21 #2
“She is the last Deskyiara.” Florian turns to him and grabs his shoulder, shaking it as he is determined for him to believe. For me to believe. Because I sure as hell don’t.
“The Deskyiara bloodline is gone. It has been for many years. She is not her.” Koen grabs Florian’s hand, gripping it tightly. “No matter how much you want her to be the one you lost… she will never be her.”
“She didn’t die!” Florian raises his voice, the veins in his neck pulsing with rage. “There is not even a scratch on her body! No one, unless they’re a Royal or they’ve been gifted the pendant from the Gods, can travel through the stones. She did. Explain that.”
Koen’s bottom lip drops to speak, but he bites it, yanking his body away from us with his hands against his head. His curls fall down to his shoulders and sway as he shakes his head with anger. He grunts before letting out a raging yell that is as if he has been holding in for years.
“Impossible.” He shifts his body towards Florian, pointing his finger directly at him. His arm shakes, his eyes widening with a fire flickering in them.
“You’re mad because I am right. You just don’t want to believe it.”
“We were teens! The Deskyiara bloodline had hair of silver and pure white. Serene’s is black, like the midnight sky. She is not her. She is not Viveon. Viveon Deskyiara died, just like her sister and parents. The Deskyiara bloodline is gone.”
“I’ll prove it to you.” Florian pushes through us. “I’ll find the answers in the archives.”
THE FROZEN WATERFALL SEEMS ALLURINGLY close yet just beyond our grasp as we trudge through the snow, which gradually turns into a slick sheet of ice. The archives lie hidden behind the waterfall, a place that only those of the Ice Nation bloodline may enter. Therefore, I am bound to remain outside.
By myself.
The ice is dangerously slippery, and our boots skitter and slide with every step.
I find myself reaching out to steady myself on Koen’s shoulder with each step over the icy terrain.
His soft eyes lock on mine once I grab him again, almost in an unspoken plea for me to speak to him. But I don't. I won’t.
The smokey sky is filled with dark clouds, no view of the sun, and the temperature feels as if it’s dropping by the second. Ice begins to freeze on the small hairs of my bare arm, my eyelashes flicker for the ice to fall off and my teeth chatter uncontrollably.
“Shouldn’t have ripped off that sleeve.” Florian looks over his shoulder at Koen and me, his golden hair whipping at his cheeks. “Still unsure why you did that.”
I swallow, my throat tightening. I did it for Koen. I’m unsure why the hell I did something like that for a man who would rip another woman's heart out without even a second thought. I feel sorry for Lykia. Even though I don’t know her.
I ripped my sleeve for… Koen. The more I think about this, the more I sound insane. I care about the way he sees me. I want him to still see the Serene he saw in his mother’s room. I don’t want to be unfamiliar. Maybe I am just worried he won’t look at me the way he did before.
How pathetic am I?
I am not this woman. I am the woman at the bar with her sister and friend, throwing drinks at the drunken bastards that get handsy on us. I am the woman who burns my ex’s shit in a box outside of his front door for cheating on me.
I am not this woman. I can’t be this woman. I want the old me back. What is Koen turning me into?
Now, I am freezing once more in the Ice Nation, on the edge of dying, when I could have been warm in the new suit Florian gifted me. But I destroyed it, just to have the chance for Koen’s eyes to linger on me once more.
Oh if Tilly and Alice could see this, they would die of laughter. And I would die from embarrassment.
“Why did you do that?” Koen glances over towards me as I walk beside him, my boots slipping and sliding around the ice as my hands dart out to the side.
“It was bothering me.” I clear my throat, catching a deep breath as I almost slip and fall. “I was used to my old suit, and the new one felt uncomfortable.”
Florian halts, turning his chest towards us. “That was for your protection!” he growls, his eyes narrowing. “Now you have a weak spot.”
“It's just an arm.” My lips form a tight smile, catching up to him as Koen walks beside me, ready to catch me if I fall.
“It’s not just an arm.” Florian hovers over me as I take my last step up to him. “You know nothing about the prophecy. You need your body. You need to stay alive.”
“Aren’t you glad you didn’t kill me now?” I choke on a laugh. My eyes glint as I tease him. “That would have sucked for you.”
Florian rubs his lips before pulling them into a smile. He adjusts his daggers against his waist. “That would have sucked. But not only for the curse part.” He pauses, his eyes locking onto mine. “Also the dying part.”
“You’d miss me.” I shove his shoulder, moving past him on the ice.
Koen grunts, his eyes rolling away from us. “What curse?”
Him and Florian stride up beside me. They walk on the ice as if they have been doing this their whole life. Meanwhile, I am struggling, catching my breath every second as this is burning my muscles. I strain with each step, trying my best not to fall and slam into the frozen lake beneath us.
“You haven’t heard about the curse?” Florian holds out his hand for me and I take it, taking steps with him. Koen sighs, letting his head fall back before scratching the back of his neck. He is hating this.
“No, brother. Enlighten me.”
“If you kill the Prophecy Queen, there is a curse that will mark you for life. The Realms are unsure of what the curse would be, all we know is that whoever takes the life of the Prophecy Queen will be cursed by the Gods.” Florian’s eyes falter from Koen to me.
I clear my throat, gripping Florian’s hand tighter as I almost slip again. “I used to tease him about it.”
“How cute.” Koen’s jaw clenches.
My eyes widen, glancing towards Koen as he cracks his neck. Slowly and deliberately. As if there is a tension inside him that won’t release. My lips part to take a silent breath before my teeth begin to chatter once more. “Are you sure the stone will protect me from the cold?”
“I promise.” Florian nods. “Keep the sack on you. Just the stone next to you will produce heat, but if you feel you need more, hold it. You won’t be able to travel without the pendant I wear or the Deskyiara blood. So don’t cut yourself.”
“I am not her,” I say, shaking my head.
“You are, and I’m going to prove it.” Florian sighs as we take our last steps to be front and center to the towering frozen waterfall. He lets go of my hand, and Koen starts walking in without even a glance my way.
Florian’s eyes follow his steps. “He must be in a mood.”
I cock my head to the side. “He is always in a mood.”
“I wondered how living in the dormitory with him was going?” Florian’s brow lifts with curiosity.
My lips part to speak, to say something negative about how life has been with him the past week, but I can’t lie.
He rescued me, multiple times. Slept by my bed every night.
He helped train me, even when he didn’t want to.
He has been nothing but perfect. Kind. Gentle.
Even after that one morning the darkness took over, he has been by my side every day and every night.
I pull my waves out of my face, letting the strands sit behind my ear. “It’s been okay. He hasn’t been awful. He has been by my side, guiding me through this.”
He instantly averts his gaze away from me, as if my response isn’t quite what he hoped for. A slight tension flickers across his features, making my fingers dig into my palms. With a slight shift of his shoulders, he clears his throat. “I’ll be back.”
He turns sharply and heads away from me into the frozen waterfall.
A deep sigh escapes my lips, watching him weave into the open cracks in the side of the frozen water, watching his body flicker in the ice as he walks and then vanishes.
My eyes scan around, but no one is here besides us.
No one followed, I remind myself. No one can travel through the Realms without the Light Stone.
My brows pull inward while my heart flutters widely in my chest. The pendant. Florian’s pendant is similar to the one Tilly had found.
I instantly shake my head, removing the thought of it being connected to this place.
It couldn’t be.
But as I rub my freezing arms, I hear a slight whisper in the breeze.“You are not supposed to be here.”
My eyes squint, trying to see through the slight smoke that hisses off of the frozen lake. A chill rushes through me, not from the cold, but the uncomfortable feeling that someone is watching me.
“Come, child.” The woman’s voice is soft as it carries in the wind, bouncing off of the mountains around us. “Walk towards me.”
I glance over my shoulder at the waterfall and close my eyes. I’ll be right back. I need to understand what this voice is, who this voice is, and why it is calling out to me. I need to understand everything.
With a long stride, I catch a deep breath, determined to walk over the frozen lake without falling. Each step I take, I count, focusing on the numbers playing in my mind and steadying my heart rate.
“Who is there?” I call out, my eyes darting in all directions, spinning around on my toes to look behind me. My arms stretch outward, controlling my balance as I now don’t have Koen or Florian here beside me. I’m all alone.
I wonder, did the voice wait to call out to me until they left?
My eyes burn, the freezing wind whipping at my face as a fog lifts around me.
I lift my hand up, squinting as I see a dark figure—a shadow—gesturing me to follow.
I should be smart and turn around, but I don’t.
I need answers. This voice led me here to the Realm of Azure, and I plan to uncover why it did.
“Hello?” I hunch myself down, trying to see through the thick fog that feels as if the clouds above have fallen down on me. “Who are you?”
“Keep walking, child… all your questions can be answered if you keep walking.” The voice feels so close. If I just take a few more steps out towards her, I can unravel the truth.
The fog grows denser with each step, wrapping itself around me, suffocating me as the air turns frigid and bites at my skin.
I try to draw in a breath, but my lungs won’t expand, forcing desperate gasps from my lips.
My hands fly to my throat, fingers clawing at my neck in a frantic attempt to breathe.
Damn it, just breathe.
I hear the ice cracking, and my eyes widen at the ice beneath me beginning to splinter, watching deep cracks begin to stretch outward around me.
I can feel the icy surface shifting beneath my feet, almost losing my balance as I sway back and forth.
My eyes widen in horror, watching as the cracks snake outward like a spiderweb.
I go to yell, knowing it's helpless as I still struggle to breath but suddenly, a bright light bursts forth from the depths of the lake, cutting through the darkness with an otherworldly glow.
It blinds me. I can’t see. I can’t breathe.
And then the ice breaks fully underneath me, swallowing me into the freezing water.
My arms flail wildly, fighting with every ounce of energy I have left to claw upwards toward the surface, but the freezing water drags me down. I am sinking. I am drowning.
Panic surges through me as the light brightens around me.
Bubbles erupt violently, blocking my vision from seeing anything except my arms that whip around me.
I choke on the water, and I can feel myself slipping away.
This cannot be how I die. As I fall, I see something move through the blinding light and thousands of bubbles.
I catch sight of a shadowy figure, a dark silhouette sprinting with urgency across the surface to my left.
Someone is sprinting from where I came from. Florian?
As my eyes widen, the light brightens, beaming and heating up the water around me.
The water begins to scorch my skin and I flinch with agony as I scream underwater, gurgling and suffocating as the pain is unbearable.
A sharp burning pain singes at my bare arm, as if someone is digging a hole into my skin and melting lava into me.
My veins burn, my lungs feel as if they are on fire despite drowning in the frozen lake. The water boils around me.
I shoot a fierce glare upwards, my eyes flickering between a shadowy darkness and a blinding light, teetering on the edge of consciousness as I'm about to black out. Stars begin to glitter at the edge of my eyes, and I start to feel no pain.
I am dying.
Hurry, Florian, I plead out to him. My heart screams for him to hurry.
This must be it.
And as I let my arms sway above me, letting the water take me without a fight, a white orb hovers in front of me. I can hardly see it due to the light illuminating from it.
“It is time, child.”