Chapter 41
Edgar
The fields carry on for miles in every direction. After a few minutes, a warm glow illuminates the sky from beneath a canopy of trees. Not a glow from the fireflies. No, this light is man-made.
Fire.
“There, that’s where I heard her scream.” Rowan’s throat bobs as he swallows his guilt for fleeing. Fear rises in his eyes once more and I wonder if he’ll flee again.
I place my hand on his shoulder. “Let’s get closer. We need to be quiet and stealthy. Use your Shadow if you have to, okay?” I calmly instruct him. Rowan nods and clenches his trembling hands.
Tents and fires spread throughout the valley below. My nerves are welling within me but I push them down. I can’t let myself feel anxious right now. We have to ensure Lucina’s safety and we need to keep level heads. Feelings only make us lose control—I learned that much from the blight classes. Fear, anger, hate. I cannot allow myself to feel those while fighting, or I’ll blight all my friends.
We sneak down to the camp, keeping low in the ears of barley. The bushes rustle just a few yards ahead of us. I raise my hand to signal Rowan to stop. Silently, I narrow my eyes against the dim light. I can just make out the tips of four heads. I catch the glare of a pair of glasses and the glint of blonde hair.
“Oh, thank gods.” I breathe a sigh of relief. Rowan eagerly creeps ahead. At least we’re all back together now.
As we approach, our friends hear us and turn around. Their eyes are wide with fear and readiness to fight.
I quickly whisper, “It’s us.” A few release their held breaths and they move forward to meet us. Tamaris, Alani, Vinnie, Aervin. Lucina is the only one that may have been captured. We can save her—we have to.
Aervin lets the tension in his shoulders ease. “What the hell happened?” They all stare at me expectantly as if I know the answers. I should know… I’m the one that sent them here so carelessly.
“I don’t know. I didn’t think portals could transport us to separate locations. Unless this was intentional…” I trail off. Could this have been a trap? I’m certain that this is the portal selected for the exams. So why… Shame rises up inside my chest. I should’ve listened to Kai and Finn.
“How will we return to Alkrose?” Tamaris growls. Her long black ponytail rests over her shoulder. She has a good point.
I clench my teeth together tightly. “I don’t know.”
“Excuse me—what?” Vinnie snaps. His usual collected composure has fractured.
I shake my head and desperately look to Aervin for help. He only returns my panicked gaze and lowers his head. “I don’t know either,” Aervin admits.
Alani covers her mouth as if to keep in her breakfast. Rowan shares the same horrified expression.
The pit sinks deeper inside my chest. “We’re going to be okay. After we find Lucina, we’ll locate the portal home.” I force myself to say the words with unequivocal surety.
I’m about to say more when a scream fills the air. Lucina’s scream.
Her voice is imbued with pain. The sound of it makes my blood thicken with despair.
“We need to move, now.”
We hastily make a shabby plan, one that I’m not sure will work, but we have no other choice. It’s already been far longer than I expected us to stay in Fernestia and nothing has gone as expected. Now my only goal is to save Lucina and get all of us back to the castle.
We split up.
Aervin is to retrieve Lucina and get her out. The rest of us will fight.
I have the task of taking out most of the Darkflies since my powers are the strongest. Even with the casts, the darkness I wield is powerful. The others are to serve as support and decoys.
This will work. It has to.
I rise straight up from our hiding spot in the brush. I manipulate the darkness I’ve stored and create projections of black serpents that slither through the grass stalks. I can control around ten at a time, and that will have to do. The tents in the camp are ten feet apart and figures become visible as I near them. Many soldiers, men and women, sit close to the flames and drink what must be mead. The air swarms with the bitter scent of it. I take a deep breath and shout, “Hey!”
The air stills around me and in the corners of my eyes, I see my comrades tensing in their hiding positions.
The enemy soldiers whirl and reach for their weapons in a heartbeat. Some charge straight for me with no guns or knives at all and I know instantly that they are the most lethal—the ones with powerful Shadows. The Darkflies start to raise their hands up, the grim sky booming with licks of lightning as rain starts to pelt down on us. Dark magic pulses from each of them, plumes of smoky ebony dust.
Darkness is falling—it’s descending around me like blood spreading in water, clouding around me and starving for my blood.
One of them shouts, breaking the sworn silence from both sides. “Kill them all!”
My teeth burn hot at the soldier’s words. Sully twists inside my chest, desperately trying to break the casts placed on it to no avail. It pushes inside my skull. Its indistinguishable whispers are eerie. My arm hairs rise with goosebumps and I close my eyes, raising my deadly fingers into the air. It feels as though I’m about to play a song of death on the clouds themselves. When my eyes reopen, darkness swells in the space before me.
“I’m going to eradicate all of you,” I mutter, my lips twitching into a crooked smile.
Threads of my rage manifest from the black mist around me. Gasps spread through the enemy troops and power explodes from them as they try to hit me first. The cloud of black surrounding me disperses as I close my fists and pull them to my chest, absorbing their Shadows in the blink of an eye. The field clears and their horrified faces are all that remain.
Their efforts are in vain.
My heart fills with wrath, a hate so dreadful and deep that I can hardly grasp my emotions.A wicked smile stretches across my face as I refocus my attacks and blood begins to spray. A song of destruction that I’ve been desperately waiting to hear for far too long is finally thrumming through my ears.
A female soldier casts her Shadow out toward me. It shapes into a fierce wolf creature, its face is a shroud of black—unlike Arthur’s, which bears a skull—and it tears through the wheat field at an impressive speed. I’m quicker though.
I wave my hand over the wolf a mere inch from my face and the Shadow beast implodes into dust. Sully lashes out closer to the surface beneath my skin, cracking through a few of the power casts, and sends a surge of lethal smoke to surround the female soldier with black, shifting sand. Her screams are short-lived as her bones shatter inside the cocoon of my power. Her blood mixes with the rain that drums down from the sky. I extend my hand and let the liquid pool in my palm.
Vinnie and Rowan are in the thick of battle to my left. They let loose a display of impressive techniques, fending off a few soldiers but remaining tight in battle with them. I search for Alani and Tamaris. They are cutting down soldiers on their end as well. Triumph floods me. These Fernestians are weak. I expected much more from them.
I knew we were ready for this. This changes everything. Hope and adrenaline fill my chest. Sully tears at the casts savagely inside me, completely breaking two and leaving two in place. I roll my shoulders back and crack my neck with the surplus of dread and power that my Shadow feeds through my bones.
I obliterate a few more soldiers as I proceed toward the camp—their blood sprays across the wheat like burst paint cans.
I thought killing would be difficult, but I don’t feel anything.
Not a fucking thing.
A second wave of Fernestian soldiers spills from the tents farther back. These ones look different. Their tactical gear is gray, unlike the black of the ones we’ve just slaughtered. One of them in particular is especially menacing. His body is at least double the size of mine. His ebony helmet is spiked down the center. He holds a large crescent sword of fire with two hands. He’s like a mythical god of war.
I narrow my eyes on this soldier. He must be the commander. His flames grow hotter with each step he takes, transitioning from red to blue. He’s the image of brutality.
I can handle him. I can do this.
A smaller Darkfly steps from behind the ominous knight. He’s dressed in a simple dark brown leather coat and pants—clearly not suited for war. He stares at me briefly with the eyes of a goat. His appearance sends shivers up my spine. The small soldier looks away and speaks to the large one—no doubt giving him information that perhaps only his odd eyes can learn about me.
I flex my fingers. My only choice is to attack before they do. The commander lifts his head toward me as if newfound knowledge had been bestowed on him.
Clashing Shadows and weapons sound from behind me, gunfire and screams too. I’m keenly aware of everything around us. I raise my arm into the air and let it fall straight forward—aiming at the commander. Power licks at my fingertips as my black sand frenzies out with wicked speed. I dare lift the corner of my lips. No one can avoid such an attack.
The commander swings his blade and blocks my attack like it’s nothing more than an insect to be swatted. The black magic counters and lands just a few feet in front of Alani and Tamaris, exploding upon impact and throwing my female comrades back.
“No!” I shout.
I flash my eyes back at the commander and try to hit him with a close-range attack. His hand cuts straight through it and grabs hold of my jaw. He cackles as his fingers dig into my face and he throws me with irrefutable force, tearing the flesh clean off my jaw. My body tumbles and rolls. My forearms snap as I attempt to keep them up.
Tamaris and Alani scream once more as the commander trudges toward them.
I struggle to my feet, blood spilling down my throat. But before I can run over to them, the commander brings his blade down with a force I cannot escape. My eyes widen with horror as his dark helmet reflects the image of him slashing my feeble body. He’s so close that I can hear the hiss of his breath as he straightens and tries to pull his blade from my body. He tugs over and over, shaking my limp, broken body like a rag until the sharp hook of the crescent blade unlatches from my bones. Black fire burns my face, chest, and arm.
My chest is burning. I’m on fire.
My breaths shorten and I let out a sharp cry. Blood gushes from my chest and soaks my tactical gear. Cold spreads where the liquid cools on me. My throat itches something awful, like ants are eating me from the inside out. I try to lift my head to see where the commander is. How did he move so fast?
Dying… Am I dying? My mind races and fear is all know. I trace the commander with my eyes as he heads toward my comrades.
“No… No!” I cry out desperately, the gurgling of my blood drowning out the words.
“Edgar!” Vinnie shouts, his eyes flashing with horror. He and Rowan charge toward the commander, unaware of his power. They won’t be able to handle his strength. They need to run away. They have to get away.
“R-run,” I choke out, but it’s so quiet it doesn’t reach them.
This is my fault. I don’t want to watch. Please. I can’t force myself to look away no matter how much I try. Darkness creeps in the corners of my vision.
A sharp cut slices through every other sound in the night. The crackling fire, the rain, the gunshots, and screams—it all ends with a disturbing gurgle bubbling from my comrade’s throats.
It stops all of my thoughts. All my dreams.
Everything.
My eyes meet Vinnie’s, then Rowan’s. The commander’s flaming crescent sword hit them both at once. Their blood sprays into the night air like the wings of fireflies—they seem to glow with the heat from the Darkfly’s fire.
I watch their lights flicker out. Their short lives spent.
I tremble as my veins start to chill. Cold seeps in and I can’t tell if it’s from death reaching for me or parts of my soul being ripped to shreds.
Vinnie’s glasses project off his face and land against my forehead, the glass already shattered. Shards pierce my eye but I don’t feel the pain. I just blink through the blood, unable to stop watching.
Half. They were cut in half. My friends are, they’re?—
I watch the two of them fall soundlessly, their innards tumbling out and surrounding their vacant bodies. Steam rolls off from their centers and I gag. Vinnie’s eyes are bulged and wide, cheeks smeared with dirt and debris. Rowan’s eyes are narrowed, twitching and distant as his lips mumble something before going still.
My stomach curls but vomit won’t rise. Then I hear a wrenching scream from Alani. She’s fallen to her knees at what became of Vinnie and Rowan. Her body shakes with terror and Tamaris stands in front of her in a sad attempt to protect her from the approaching commander. He stalks slowly toward them, lazily even, as if this is all so meaningless to him.
How many times have Alani and Tamaris fought with each other? How many times had they sworn hate for one another? Yet here Tamaris is protecting Alani. Selflessly. Foolishly.
I take another short, wheezy breath, my lungs losing their strength to take in air. I want to close my eyes. Desperately wish to look away to save myself from witnessing it. But I can’t.
Tamaris lets her Shadow whirl around the two of them in an attempt to escape, but the commander cuts through it easily, his flames burning nearly white.
Tamaris holds strong, still standing above Alani as if she can actually do anything against the fucking monster. Her gaze flicks to mine in her last moments.
I see fear in its rawest form. I see the grief that she feels already from all the death that’s come tonight. But more than that, I see the question in her eyes: Why? Why did we come here? The look of betrayal burns into my soul.
Why did I bring them here?
My heart twists and cracks. I want to fucking scream and scream until I cannot bear it any longer.
Tamaris closes her eyes and Alani braces against her leg. The commander brings down his blade with a single swing of Shadow hellfire. He strikes it straight through Tamaris’s heart, piercing all the way through her torso and Alani’s neck behind her.
There is no crying—no pain or blood.
Their bodies ignite into abnormal black flames, evaporating all but their bones in a matter of seconds. Their skeletons hold the positions they were in just moments ago. Their jaws open in the silent wails they weren’t able to let out.
Tears spill from my eyes. The pain inside me cannot be described. It’s vicious and rotting.
I’ve lost everything. Everything. In a matter of moments. And the worst part is that it’s all my fault.
It’s my fault my friends are dead.
Pain crackles across my eyes, forcing them shut. I let out an anguished wail. Not for my own agony, the bleeding of my heart and soul, but for my mistakes that others paid for in blood.
Footsteps crunch on the gravel near my head and I know the commander has returned to finish me off. My eyes open enough to see a large boot crush Vinnie’s glasses.
Four fireflies take to the sky from the barley around the boot, drawing in my weakening consciousness.
Fireflies. We were fireflies. Terra’s words soak into my soul. “Because they gave all they had to show us their light. They must rest—as we all do.”
I cry and the taste of death blooms across my tongue.
You were right, Terra.