Chapter 17
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
PARIS
Ifinished singing, the song a gentle hum swirling around the clearing as if maintaining its existence.
So weird.
Clearing my throat, I watched the rose petals fall around Silvanus.
Silvanus had a sister? I’d seen it, heard her speak, but not the vampire king. His answers were muted.
Ugh. Of course they were.
I tried calling out to him, but only a tangle of sounds sputtered off my tongue.
What the hell?
Best of all, I couldn’t move more than a few feet away from the bush.
“Dammit!” I hissed, glowering at Caer. “What’s going on?”
She inspected a blackberry held between thumb and forefinger, squeezing out some of the juice.
“Hello?” I pressed when she didn’t answer.
“I heard you, precious one,” she replied gently.
“Then can you tell me why I can’t go to Silvanus?”
She lifted her lavender gaze to mine. “While we are here, I want to keep him at bay. He might be part of this, but I would also like to maintain a level of privacy for the elves in the room. Well, the clearing.”
Maybe it was a deity thing, but she really came across snooty.
“That seems a bit mean,” I countered.
She smiled. “I can smell him on you.”
My face heated. “Oh. Let’s not talk about it.” A sudden spike of horror came over me. “Oh, shit. You didn’t see or hear—”
“No. I’m no voyeur to crude behaviors, Paris.”
Crude?
“I would like for you to be more respectful of your body and your heart from now on. There is work to be done.”
Mind your damn business. “Uh-huh. Fine.”
She took my hand, running her thumb over my knuckles. “How are you feeling?” Her touch was cold and unwelcome.
“I’m sweetcream,” I answered, freeing my hand to shove them both in my dressing gown pockets.
Damn. Couldn’t this vision provide a proper outfit for the occasion?
At least the rest of me stayed warm, only the skin she’d touched was chilly.
A louder line of the song wafted past me like a melodious echo that wouldn’t die, and the blue-and-orange sky swirled like paint in water.
“During my resting, I have seen things,” she said. “The song is reenergized for now, so we must use it while we can.”
Her foresight power could conjure visions and dreams of the future and the past. Like the one I’d just seen. My singing allowed us to share the details, for me to come here. And Silvanus tagged along for the ride because of his involvement with Aidan.
“This fragment of the king’s memory is important,” she said. “More will come hopefully with clear answers.”
I drew luck down my chest.
Then I told her about my vision, which the vampire didn’t share with me for some reason.
She steepled her fingers before her face. “I see. Fascinating. Whatever this thing is, it appears to be keeping you safe from death. But why, and what is the significance of the dagger?”
All questions in an endless loop in my head.
Shit. “Do you think it’s Aidan related?” I had to ask the question.
She shook her head. “No. He would not be able to hide it from me. Still, how does our little mystery keep its secrets?”
Don’t call it that. “Great,” I huffed.
“But you are connected to him,” she said. “Bound to him by setting him free.”
I rubbed the back of my neck. “Yeah, I got that loud and clear.”
She sighed dreamily. “He wants more of you, but I locked him out.”
Ooo! Good news! “You did?”
“Yes. Although, I would not say he is completely sealed off. But he will seek to sever the connection, which we must stop. If he is free of these restrictions, his power will expand.”
Fear chewed my insides. “He seems pretty powerful already.”
“Of course.” There was that snootiness again.
Pfft. Whatever.
Caer dropped the berry onto the grass. “We must get to the Carving Glade as soon as possible.”
Should I hit her with a snotty response?
I stifled the sassiness. “And it’s safe to do so now?”
“There is no safe time to move.”
Then why say it before? Ugh. “Awesome. We’ll head out as soon we can.”
“Tomorrow at sundown,” she added. “It must be then. This is a matter of urgency.”
No shit. “How are we getting there?”
There were planes, trains, cars, and a flying vampire king. How many miles away, though? I’d say about six-thousand ish between here and the Summer Forest—the Carving Glade’s location is in the southern region of the Elf Domain.
Not exactly a hop, skip, and hello away. Probably about sixteen hours flight time.
I wasn’t entirely sure.
Oof. Could I stand being flown there in Silvanus’s arms? And would he be able to manage such a long distance? Assuming he agreed to tag along, of course. I guess kings couldn’t just pop off on an adventure at will. Especially when his people were under fire.
My executioner senses tingled, as if to remind me of who I was.
Yeah, that ship had sailed and sunk, with me lost out in the dark, dark sea.
“The snake shifter can help,” she suggested.
“Oh. Right. If she agrees.”
“Discuss it with her and the king,” Caer answered, “but there will be no compromises. We leave at sundown.”
Bossy much? “Gotcha. Then what happens?”
She snapped her fingers. “Walk with me.”
I obeyed, unsure if my legs moved at her command or not. “What about Silvanus?”
“Did you miss what I said about privacy?”
Check your damn attitude! “But he’s involved.”
“Can I not speak with my precious one first?”
That made me feel a little sick. “Fine. Lead the way.”
We walked amongst the rose bushes, side by side, our backs to the vampire king. My instincts told me to join him, not to leave him alone in this place. It didn’t seem fair, and also pretty mean.
But how could I argue with a deity? Aidan only knew what she’d do if I mouthed off at her too hard.
Not Aidan!
Damn this rancid habit. It made my tongue hurt.
“There has been an interesting development at the Carving Glade,” she announced, running her hands over the roses. “Although I maintain its protection, I am locked out.”
Whoa. That was a shock. “How come?”
“A dimming in my power,” she said.
Uh-huh. “Okay. Is there a key to get inside?” I asked.
She stopped, bending to smell a rose. “Yes. An elf Druid. He is the gatekeeper of the glade, his wife a Carver. We will go to his home in Glimmer City to get the appropriate rune disk from him.”
Rune disks were carved from the wood of a tree in the Carving Glade by Carvers, who then inked elvish runes onto it with the blackberries. This process created a spell for the Druids to use. Each disk was a one-shot thing.
With Caer inside me, I could absorb the disk’s magical energy and use the spell, still sticking to the one-shot rule. And in the glade, a new spell would be created to help destroy Aidan.
She’d made the disk that I’d freed Aidan with, for the whole freeing-him-to-begin shit, but she needed that glade place going forward.
Wait a second. “How does this gatekeeper know he’s a gatekeeper?”
“He will once you meet him,” she said. “You will sing for him, allowing me to reach out and touch him. Show him his ancestors, why the disk has been passed down his family line all these years.” She smiled. “Regardless of Aidan’s rot, he and his predecessors knew their duty.”
Man, I needed a cig.
“And this is how I think we can defeat him,” she added.
“Or least weaken him.” She smelled the rose again.
“He feeds faith. Even if worship isn’t what it once was, there is still belief in him.
His name is holy. Remove that, and he is diminished.
” She smiled again. “If we magnify the song to a global scale, we can show everyone the truth and hurt him. Although that will only make him more dangerous.”
Whoa. This was a lot.
“Do not let the guilt over setting him free get to you.”
I blinked, stunned by the swerve in subject. “Oh…I…”
“The lie would have only soured the world,” she said. “Taken it in dark directions. More war, a different kind of rot bringing it to its devastation. In freeing him, there is hope for better days ahead. Much better days.”
Damn. I hated her being inside me and sensing my emotions. But at least I had an answer to that question.
The guilt slapped like a brick in a sock, though. Really packing a punch.
Time to change the subject myself.
“Yeah,” I agreed, beginning to shiver. “So, who are these elves?”
Her smile seemed a little sardonic to me. “The mother and father of an elf you know.”
My first thought was the thrall who’d tried to kill me. “Not Elio?”
“Yes. I want you to take him with you to soften the blow of truth.”
My anger started to slosh. “He doesn’t need to be there.”
“Yes, he does, precious one. You must put aside this hatred and work for the greater good.”
That term, that rotten fucking term the Global Order loved to bandy around.
I balled my hands into fists, keeping my frustrations in a safe.
Don’t lose your head here.
“But—”
“These are not the days for pettiness,” she added, not helping.
“Disliking someone trying to murder me isn’t petty, it’s natural,” I threw back.
“Yet you sullied your body with the touch of your actual murderer,” she countered.
Whoa. Talk about a kick in the balls.
She plucked a rose from the bush. “But you are mortal and susceptible to the longings of your body. It’s a failure I have never understood.”
Sex as a failing? I guess she had a point, but really?
“I’ll be doing better on that front from now on,” I rebutted.
“Excellent news.” She tucked the rose into her hair, unbothered by the huge thorns on its stem.
Yikes.
“Now, let us return to business. Keep walking.”
I followed her a few steps before saying, “Couldn’t we just take the disk?”
“If it comes to it, yes,” she answered, sounding upset. “But we must avoid sliding into too much immorality. Follow my plan first.”
Hmmm. A cheeky bit of theft paled in comparison to Aidan’s plans for domination.
She led us to the edge of the forest. A cluster of butterflies fluttered nearby, each one a different color of the rainbow.
“Isn’t it lovely here?” she whispered.
“Yeah. Pretty.” I might have sounded indifferent, but the place was easy on the eyes.
The deity stepped closer to me, placing her hands on my shoulders. “Together, we can do this.”
My eyes grew hot. “Right.”
Caer touched my left cheek with the back of her cold hand. “We were brought together to change the world. I have every faith in our success. And faith can be a fantastic weapon against the darkness.”
I nodded in agreement.
She removed her hand, a gentle gust of wind flowing through her hair. “Trying times await, precious one. We will overcome. We will triumph.”
Call me an elfy puppet on a string.
Caer looked to the sky. “For now, I will say goodbye. I have told you what we must do. Get to the Elf Domain.”
Before I could respond, rose petals fell around me in a thick curtain. Lines of the song coiled around me in a spiral of sound, taking me on another journey of remembrance with Silvanus.