Chapter 28 #2
“I’d like to watch your tiny body try,” Vero says a second before at least a hundred undead surround him while Mickey smirks.
“Yeah? Just give me the word.”
“Go fight away from us if you’re going to fight. Riley is bonding with his horse,” Torin says, trying to shoo them off.
“No, no, I like this better,” I say. “Please continue. I’m not quite sure who is going to win, but I’m eager to find out. It’s significantly better than this other stuff.”
The horse eyes me before looking away, and then I feel this twinge of guilt. However, I don’t have long to consider it before Story comes over to us and Mickey sends his undead off. “I’m really sorry to interrupt, but I wanted to let you know we had a couple of houses done.”
Torin looks thrilled as he rushes over. “Perfect! Um…” He glances at me and the horse, and I wave him off.
“Go ahead. They need you more than I do right now. This bond is going to take a while to repair. I’ll catch up.”
Torin seems to think this means I plan to spend time with the horse, so he looks thrilled by the idea and leaves me without question.
As soon as everyone is gone, I hurry off for a walk, wanting to clear my mind.
I set Kit down on the ground so she can gallop ahead of me, the beautiful land stretching on farther than Kit can see.
It’s changed so much since the first time I walked through that Door.
I take a different path than we normally use, not having explored this way yet. I probably should be helping Torin and the others, but I need some time to think.
There’s a lovely path that stretches ahead of me, the road cutting into the trees as I wonder if it leads to another village I haven’t yet seen, but instead of following it, my eyes are fixated on mounds in the distance.
I make my way over to them and am all too soon met with graves—probably a mass grave in the middle of smaller ones.
The sound of the horse drawing close alerts me. I turn and throw my arms up, trying to shoo him away as that tightness in my stomach returns. “Get away from me!”
The horse ignores me and continues walking toward me. Sensing my pain, Kit rushes over, climbing up my body and onto my shoulder while I grab a rock and throw it at the horse. It hits the animal’s broad chest, but he doesn’t seem to care as he keeps getting closer.
“I don’t fucking want you. I don’t want to be near you.
I don’t want… I don’t want my power back.
I don’t want to fix this,” I admit. “Torin is thrilled to have new life in his world after I destroyed everything. I killed them all with this power. Why would I ever want it back? So if you just stayed away, I’d never even have the chance to get it back! So please… just stay away.”
The horse ignores me. Why wouldn’t he? He’s just an animal that has no idea what I’m saying.
Irritation and anger rush through me when the horse reaches me and presses his forehead against me. I start to move back, but instead grab the animal to keep from falling as I find myself standing before Aemon in what must be a memory.
“You know we can do great things together, you and I. With your strength, we could control all of the realms—”
“How much greatness are you going to share?” I ask.
The ground shakes while darkness roils above me.
It’s suffocating.
And the god is so pleased by it.
Suddenly, I’m alone, hunched over that book we’d found in Torin’s library. After every page I scan, I write hurriedly on loose papers, but nothing I write down is enough. It’s never enough.
“What do you hope to do?” Conquest asks. “We can’t break free from his hold. What do you think we can even accomplish?”
“I’m going to bind him to this realm.”
“How? How could you find the strength to do so?”
“There’s a way.”
Conquest seems to get a look at what I’m writing, and his face pales. “No! You can’t do that. You can’t. You don’t know what doing this will unleash.”
“If I lose myself, I need you to kill me.”
“You know I’m not strong enough. You can’t do this.”
“If I fail to kill him, I will at least lock him in this realm. It’s already been ravaged. There’s nothing left to it. He can live out his eternity here.”
“If you fail… there’s no hope, Brother.”
“You act as if there was hope to begin with. Where is our sister?”
“She wanders. It’s hard to reach her anymore, even when she’s standing right in front of us.
We’ve already lost her. He’s fed her hope of repairing a life taken.
Her love for the goddess is too strong. We’re supposed to be superior beings yet here we are, being dragged down by the very same things humans are: love, greed, envy…
” He sighs. “If you do this and fail, you know it’ll mark the end, right? ”
“I won’t fail.”
The scene abruptly changes, and I’m in the middle of a field, gasping, like I need air to breathe.
There’s something dark crawling down my body as I drop to my knees and watch while the life is sapped from the ground.
It drains life from the very plants that once bloomed beautifully.
As my body absorbs the life from this world, I feel it collide and clash with the magic already inside of me.