Thirteen #2
It hurts more than if he’d called me a monster.
Marissa bristles. “He saved my life in the last trial. I’d be dead if not for—”
“Maybe you should be,” Callen interrupts. He stares at Marissa, voice low. “Don’t you see? There’s no mercy here. There’s just killing and waiting to be killed. The sooner we stop pretending otherwise, the better.”
Marissa flinches as if he has struck her, and something hot moves through my chest.
“What are you going to do?” I ask, trying to keep my voice soft.
“I’m going to find Morwen," he says.
The island to our right. Water, if the Mother Shard has arranged us like the Dominions.
“She’s—the Waterborn understand what matters.”
“And how are you going to get there?” I ask before I can stop myself. “Have you learned to fly?”
“I’ll work something out,” he bites back. “Better than waiting here with you. I’d rather be with people who actually believe in something.”
I don’t have the strength to keep arguing. I could try to stop him, but I don’t know if I could bring myself to do it. I watch as he turns and walks away, heading for the far edge of the island.
I almost reach for him. Almost.
But my hand never leaves my side.
Marissa wipes tears from her eyes. She looks at me properly, and her voice drops to a whisper. “Are you scared?”
I find myself looking for Kael.
He isn’t here.
I want to tell her no, that I’m brave, that I have a plan. But I am terrified, and I don’t.
I nearly say yes, but the words won't come, so I just nod.
“Me too,” she says. “What do we do now?”
I drag a breath into my lungs and try to think.
Then the world begins to move.
A rumble rolls through the island, followed by the sound of rocks scraping together.
Movement draws my eye left. Rask is already moving. He and Orla are picking their way across a bridge that wasn’t there moments ago—narrow and trembling, formed from the stones that had been floating through the air. The rules are changing beneath our feet.
“We need to get ready,” I say. “We hold here. If we run after Callen, they’ll follow.”
Marissa’s face is ashen, but she brushes herself off and stands taller. “I’ll help you.”
I manage a smile for her.
Rask and Orla draw closer. Beyond the mist, rocks scrape together, the sound coming from more than one direction. Other bridges are forming. I can’t see them, but I know what it means. Running might not save us. It might only lead Rask and Orla to someone easier to kill.
A chill runs over my skin.
Somewhere on these islands, someone is about to die. I just don’t know who yet.
My Mana stirs. Beneath the wind, I hear it again.
What are you?
I don’t have an answer.
Not yet.
But what rises in me isn’t fear.
It's colder than that.
We wait. There is no other word for it.
The wind cuts into our skin, chilling us to the bone. The world seems to vibrate with Rask and Orla’s approach. Marissa keeps glancing at me, wide-eyed and waiting for me to know what to do. She looks ready to sprout wings and fly away from here.
“We should move to the next island,” she whispers, but I shake my head.
“If we run, they’ll chase us, and we’ll lead them right to Callen and the Waterborn girls,” I say. “We need to try to hold them off here.”
What I don’t say is that part of me is sure Kael will come.
She swallows hard enough that the muscles in her neck tremble. “I don’t think I can do this,” she admits.
“You can, Marissa. It’s just like we practised.”
She gives the barest nod.
“Draw it to the surface,” I tell her, keeping my eyes on the makeshift bridge as it groans and shifts under Rask’s bulk. Behind them, the pathway starts to separate, the magic waning as the rocks loosen and drift apart again.
Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. So much for Kael reaching us in time.
Rask and Orla plant their feet on the island as the last of the bridge falls apart. Maybe Marissa is right. Maybe we should follow Callen. Maybe the other bridge is still intact. I don’t know the rules. The Mother Shard has a will of her own.
Rask is close now. He leers at me, his hands already bulking with the beginnings of Mana-made stone gauntlets. Orla lags behind, eyes alive with calculation as she scans her surroundings.
He charges straight at us, and I raise my hands, summoning a shield. The barrier is weak, still golden but as thin as gossamer. I cannot afford to burn through my Mana all at once.
Rask hits me like a landslide. His first punch shatters the shield into golden dust. I stagger, but right my footing before I fall. He barrels past me, straight for Marissa. She throws herself to the ground, trying to roll away, but Rask clips her with a backhand. She crumples and doesn’t move.
I move to help her, but Orla has closed in on me, her arm cocked, a dagger of stone in her fist. She swings, and I barely dodge, the blade slicing the air where my neck had been. She hisses at me, flecks of saliva catching on her lips. She looks almost gleeful.
“Give it up, Lightborn,” she sneers. “You two aren’t even worth the effort.”
“Then why are you over here trying to kill us?” I bite back.
“Because Atheron wants it done,” Orla says. “His alliance is worth it, I suppose.”
Rask laughs from where he crouches beside Marissa, winding a lock of her hair around his finger.
“Get away from her,” I shout, my voice cracking around the words.
“Don’t worry, pretty boy,” he jeers, dragging one rough finger along her cheek. “You’re first, then I’ll decide what to do with this one.”
“You’re a fucking monster,” I snap.
“Maybe so,” he says. “But this might be my last chance for a warm body.”
My stomach turns at the thought of this pig coming anywhere near Marissa. I have to do something, but I can’t even think.
I wish Kael were here. He wouldn’t hesitate. Rask would already be dead.
Orla comes at me again, but this time, something impossible happens. The world goes cold in a way I don’t recognise.
Every shadow underfoot deepens. Then shifts. In the next instant, Orla is yanked backwards by her collar, lifted off her feet by a force I can’t see.
Vaelis materialises behind her, one arm wrapped around her neck, the other hand somehow holding her stone knife. He has it against her throat. His eyes meet mine, and they are empty, analytical, even bored.
“The Prince is occupied,” he says, his voice flat as the edge of a knife. “He said you weren’t allowed to die yet. So try not to embarrass him.”
I don’t move. I don’t even breathe. He came because Kael sent him, not because he knows me or cares whether I live. Where does loyalty like that even come from?
Vaelis drags Orla aside with him, moving so quickly my eyes can’t track the motion. Orla kicks and claws at his arms, but he doesn’t even flinch. He hooks a leg behind hers, takes her down, and pins her with one foot against her throat, before levelling the stone knife at Rask.
“You think a little pebble like that can harm me?” Rask roars as he charges at Vaelis.
Before he can close the distance, Rask stumbles. I don’t even see the shadow until it is already wrapped around his legs. Rask pitches forward, face striking the ground with a crack I feel in my teeth. Another wave of shadow slams into Rask’s crumpled form and sends him rolling across the ground.
“Go,” Vaelis tells me, his voice bored. “Take the girl and get off this island. Move to the next one.”
I hesitate, not knowing if this is a trick.
“He doesn’t like repeating himself,” Vaelis says, skewering me with a look.
“You won’t fight,” he says. “You certainly won’t kill, so you’re useless here.”
He’s right.
I haul Marissa up. She’s conscious but dazed, one hand pressed to the swelling at the back of her skull. I get her feet under her and start dragging her towards where the bridge should be.
Behind me, I hear a wet, splintering crunch and a scream that is very, very brief. I turn just in time to see Vaelis drive the stone knife straight through Orla’s chest. Her body goes slack, and absurdly, some part of me tries to believe she’s only asleep.
The Mother Shard’s magic swells, filling the air until every breath feels thick as tar.
Orla’s body rises into the air, just like Sorin’s. A twisted, bleeding marionette. Golden-red light tears out of her, shredding her body to ribbons as it snakes towards the Mother Shard’s pink crystalline crown.
The golden three pulses and changes into a four.
With a sundering crack, the Earth island shears clean in two. One half falls through the mist, while the remaining piece sinks lower with every breath, dropping beneath the other five islands.
The realisation settles cold in my stomach. Orla dies, and the Earth island breaks. Rask is still alive, and one piece remains. If he dies too, does it fall further? Or does it drop out of the sky entirely?
Vaelis looks at me and gives a lazy salute, then sinks into a pool of shadow, leaving Rask alone, sprawled on the ground, howling into the wind.
We reach the edge and find the bridge to the Water island still intact, though it’s nowhere near as solid as the one Rask and Orla crossed. There are gaps, but nothing we can’t clear with a run-up.
“Did you see that?” Marissa asks, her voice trembling.
I nod, still staring at the place where Orla fell apart.
“Why didn’t he kill us too?” she asks.
“Because of Kael,” I say, because there is no point pretending otherwise.
I’m almost flattered, but the careless ease with which Vaelis ended Orla’s life turns the feeling sour. I swallow my revulsion and force my attention back to the bridge.
“We need to cross before this bridge collapses, in case the Mother Shard decides to tear it apart.”
“I’m scared,” Marissa says, and I hate how often she has had to say it. I wish I could ease her fear, but I am carrying too much of my own.
I force a smile onto my face. “Everything will be alright.”
She rolls her eyes as we step onto the makeshift bridge.
Behind us, Rask is still cursing.
We tumble onto the Water island, and the bridge splits apart behind us, its pieces scattering in the wind.