Chapter 16
SIXTEEN
Nova
From the outside, Orin’s house looked exactly as it had when I’d left it months ago. Wild, barely tamed flowerbeds; a door covered in peeling yellow paint; dusty windows open to let in the sounds of the stream bubbling nearby.
Birds chirped. The sun peeked in and out of puffy white clouds. A warm breeze ruffled my hair. It all brought back memories of beautiful days spent sitting in the creaky chairs on the back porch with Orin, discussing everything from magic to politics to dinner plans.
I’d forgotten how much I’d missed this place.
But I was not here to reminisce.
I wound my way down the cobblestone path to the front door, eyes scanning for threats. I’d seen too much these past months; I couldn’t help feeling paranoid.
Phantom was my only companion. He was little more than a wisp of shadows shaped like a tiny, lanky dragon, curled up in the pocket of my coat, his head occasionally popping out and sniffing the air. Stable and aware enough, but struggling to hold a more powerful physical form, as I’d expected.
Thalia, Zayn, and Aleks waited in the woods close by. It had been Thalia who suggested we not crowd the house, at least initially—that Orin might be more willing to talk and reveal things if we didn’t all confront him at once.
I suspected she simply wasn’t ready to face him.
As I crept closer to the house, I started to wonder if I was ready to face him.
He’d kept so, so much from me. The more I thought about it, the more angry I felt. Anger eventually overtook any sense of caution or paranoia I felt, making me march up to the door and shove it open without any hesitation.
I was prepared for the familiar scent of books and old parchment, blended with woodsmoke and various herbs.
Instead, the stench of something rotten assaulted my nose, so pungent it made my eyes water.
I found the culprit quickly: A dinner plate featuring molded bread and some sort of meat swarmed with flies.
Beside it sat a cup of tea, ice cold and completely full, along with a small bowl of spoiled fruit.
The windows had clearly been open for some time, through both sun and storm alike; the curtains hung heavy and damp, leaves and other outside debris littering the floor all around them. Several weeks’ and countless storms’ worth of debris, it looked like.
Heart pounding, I made my way to Orin’s room, to the closet where I knew he kept most of his traveling equipment.
All of it was still there.
My heart continued to race faster and faster, my magic pounding right along with it. It was so loud, so obvious, that I wasn’t surprised when I felt Aleksander’s power rise up in answer. His voice was in my mind a moment later.
Are you okay?
I wasn’t sure. It didn’t seem like Orin had planned to leave—but then again, he could be absent-minded and unpredictable. Maybe he’d simply wandered off somewhere and lost track of how long he’d been gone?
Nova?
I closed one of the windows, my hand bracing against the latch, and I took a deep breath.
He’s gone.
I ended up sitting on the back porch after all, just as I had on so many beautiful days before this one, letting the noise of the creek and the woods lull me into a calmer, more thoughtful place.
Orin never showed up.
Instead, it was the four of us talking, arguing, trying to decide what to do next.
“You know the way to this Hollow Grove place, don’t you?” Thalia asked.
“…I think so.” I frowned as I tried to picture the paths I’d last walked more than a year ago. “I’ve never been without Orin leading the way, though.”
“But do we really need him?”
“We don’t know what sort of magic is actually at work in said grove,” Zayn pointed out. “His guidance would be nice.”
“Lots of things would be nice,” Thalia countered. “It would be nice if he’d told Nova more about this grove to begin with, for example. Or if he’d properly warned her about any of these things we’re facing. But that’s not the reality we’re dealing with, now, is it?”
Zayn settled into a sun-bathed chair and stretched out, tucking his hands behind his head. “Someone’s in a bad mood.”
Thalia fumed in silence for a moment before storming down to the creek, mumbling something about annoying Soltarisan assholes.
I watched her leave, the pit in my stomach widening.
“Of course she’s in a bad mood,” I said.
“Her relationship with Orin aside, the very air of this realm is unsettling for a Shadow wielder. It feels strange to me even after only a few months of getting acclimated to Noctaris, and despite my Vaeloran blood that gives me power in both realms; I imagine it’s worse for her. ”
Thalia was a Shadow feyth. Incapable of creating magic from nothing, but able to draw out the dark energy of a given place, or to channel the magic summoned by higher divine beings.
In the Below, where Shadow magic was more abundant, she and her staff were often a force to be reckoned with.
Up here, there was much less material for her to work with.
Zayn considered this for a moment. “Her father was your teacher, right?”
“Yes.”
“He was Aetherkin?”
I nodded.
“So, a step above the feyth when it comes to the hierarchy of magic, but still technically out of his element here. Because I assume he was Shadow-aligned too, like his daughter. Or necromancy-inclined, or whatever you want to call it.”
“Yes…which is maybe why he taught me by way of lectures, more than anything. When it came to magic, his skill lay more in creating potions and trinkets and occasional weapons. Things like the bracelets I once used to temper my power.”
Yet, I’d never wondered much about his magic. Never thought it strange that he knew so much about my shadows despite not being able to fully wield them himself. It had never crossed my mind that he could possibly belong to another realm entirely.
I should have asked more questions; I felt like such a fool, standing here. A stranger in my own home. An ignorant—
No.
This wasn’t my home.
And I couldn’t afford to get weighed down by the memories and mistakes haunting the life I’d once lived here.
“The Hollow Grove is one of the few places he allowed me to actually practice my power,” I said. “We started visiting it regularly after what happened on my eighteenth birthday. It became a kind of…sanctuary.”
Aleks walked to the edge of the porch, his arms crossing over his chest and gaze narrowing on something in the distant woods.
After a couple minutes of tense silence, he said, “Whether we go to that grove now or not, I don’t think we should linger here.
There must be a reason Orin left in a hurry and didn’t come back, right? ”
“Another thing that would be nice to know,” Zayn said, “is what that reason might have been.” He threw a pointed look in my direction.
I frowned. I knew what he was suggesting—that I could use my magic to divine the past events that had taken place in Orin’s home.
Reluctantly, I got to my feet and went inside. I didn’t know where to start, so I simply made a few laps around the kitchen, dragging my fingertips across the scuffed and scratched countertops, waiting for the telltale pressure in my head that meant the past was trying to make itself known to me.
But no matter how hard I tried to visualize what had happened, I kept seeing nothing but an empty canvas of grey fog.
Maybe some lingering, messy spell of Orin’s was interfering with my ability to divine. Or maybe I wasn’t seeing anything because I was afraid, and I didn’t truly want to see anything.
Whatever the reason, I never managed to get a clear picture of whatever had happened.
I did manage to uncover emotions, though: a fresh, poignant wave of panic mangled with despair. I did my best to put that feeling into words for the others.
“Seems like we have more than enough proof that something isn’t right here,” Aleks said, “and we should leave while we can.”
Within the next few minutes, it was decided: We needed to move. And there was no point in going back to Noctaris empty-handed, so we would just have to find our way into the Hollow Grove without Orin’s guidance.
I was confident about the general direction to travel, at least. We made our way toward it, sweeping wide around the grounds of Rose Point, staying outside the perimeter affected by the curse that had trapped my mother and so many others on that fateful night seven years ago.
Even with everything else I had to focus on, the ache to make sense of that night pulsed like an old wound.
My heart raced as we walked along the curse’s edge.
As I fought through the guilt, the fear, the urge to pass beyond that edge and see my mother again, whether in my physical body or as a projected spirit.
Aleksander’s hand brushed against the small of my back. “One thing at a time,” he reminded me.
Reluctantly, I nodded.
We came to an area blanketed with withering blue and white flowers.
Just beyond it, the Hollow Wood’s wall of tall trees loomed.
A narrow path led into those trees. There were footprints that made me think it had recently been trodden upon, yet there was a tangle of briars and vines stretching across that same path, making the route impenetrable.
It almost looked intentional—like a spell woven to block our way.
“This looks familiar, but…it’s more overgrown than it should be,” I said, frowning. “I remember this area being clear, but these thorns and vines look like they’ve been growing without interference for years.”
“If there’s magic at work, the growth here could be accelerated, right?” Zayn suggested.
“It certainly wouldn’t be the strangest thing we’ve seen,” Aleks said.
I nodded. “I think this is the right path,” I said. “We just need to get through this tangled mess.”