Chapter 20
TWENTY
Aleksander
The forest seemed darker than it should have been, even accounting for the storm clouds that had been gathering all night.
I moved through the trees with determined, silent steps, though I wasn’t entirely sure what I was running from. Or running toward.
I just knew I felt restless.
I’d lost track of how much time had passed since I’d left Nova sleeping peacefully at the house.
You wouldn’t keep secrets from me, would you?
I was keeping secrets. But not because I wanted to. Only because my own mind seemed to be keeping secrets from me.
My thoughts tumbled and twisted. That strange itching beneath my skin was getting worse—like something stretching to an uncomfortable point and getting ready to snap. My magic…I trusted it less and less. Trusted myself less and less.
And gods help me, it all seemed to be at its worst whenever I was near Nova’s shadows.
And whenever I was close to that shard of Lorien’s soul, the itching, the restlessness…
it turned into something that bordered on violence.
A violence that somehow felt both foreign and terrifyingly natural.
Something a sick part of me wanted to unleash, just to see what it would do.
But I was terrified of doing something I couldn’t take back.
So I was running away. Like a fucking coward. Putting space between myself and all the apparent triggers I now had.
I could only run so far, though. Only so fast. Not to mention, I had the unnerving feeling that something was chasing me down, following me no matter which way I turned. I kept hearing footsteps. Whispers. Cracking branches and shuffling leaves.
“Just paranoid,” I muttered under my breath.
Just a paranoid fucking coward.
Then lightning split the sky, illuminating the path ahead for a brief, brilliant moment, and in that flash, I saw them: three figures blocking the narrow trail. Four more materializing from the shadows between the trees.
They all wore black clothing with no flourishes, no telling insignia; just layers of leather and cloth that blended with the night, making their true shape—and number—difficult to pick out against the dark forest background.
“It’s been a long time, Aleksander.” The smooth, sharp voice came from the center figure on the path. His face was shadowed by his hood, but I sensed, with unnerving certainty, that he was smiling. “We were hoping we’d run into you during this little excursion.”
“…Who are you?” I demanded.
“You don’t remember your former teacher?” He clutched a gloved hand to his heart, the motion exaggerated and mocking. “I’m hurt.”
I gripped the handle of my sword, stopping just short of withdrawing it.
“Severin Thane,” he said, pushing back his hood with a slow, deliberate flourish as he stepped into the light of the lanterns that some of his companions carried.
Cautiously, I took a few steps closer, trying to place his face.
His eyes were the pale greyish blue of winter ice, and they studied me with a cool, detached curiosity.
His hair was dark and streaked with silver at the temples, pulled back in a way that emphasized the severe angles of his face.
Despite the silver, there was something unsettlingly ageless about him.
Something that reminded me of the ancient look in Orin’s eyes—which I also found unsettling.
I couldn’t sense magic around him, but I didn’t think he was entirely human, either.
Then I caught sight of the symbol tattooed on his neck—a circle with a sword cutting through it—and my blood ran cold.
The Void Order.
We met at last, then.
“We were good friends, your younger self and me,” said Severin .
“I very much doubt that.” There was no shortage of gaps in my memories, but I remembered enough to know that my younger years had been sorely lacking in anyone I would have considered a friend.
And yet.
Something in this man’s quiet but commanding voice was familiar in a way that made my stomach turn. The precise enunciation. The patient cadence, as though he had all the time in the world and enjoyed watching others squirm while he took it…
I was certain now that there was crossover between the Order and the Light Keepers; was this man really someone who’d taught me when I was younger?
So much of my torturous magical training was a blur. So many memories of those brutal years slipped and fragmented whenever I reached for them, resisting my every attempt to grab hold.
Why couldn’t I just fucking remember?
Severin cocked his head, his pale eyes gleaming with something that might have been satisfaction. As if he knew I was feeling an unsettling flicker of familiarity but couldn’t understand it. As if my confusion was exactly what he’d hoped for.
“I don’t know who you are or how you know my name,” I snarled, “but I’m not in the mood for games. Tell me what you want from me or get the hell out of my sight.”
“Want?” Another figure stepped forward—a woman with white-blonde hair and eyes that blazed an unnatural silver with the next flash of lightning. “We want nothing from you. Not yet. Though that time is coming.” She studied me with unnerving intensity. “Yes; it’s coming very soon, I think.”
My magic stirred uneasily beneath my skin. Shifted and coiled, and—not for the first time—I felt like it was something alive, something separate from me that wanted out.
The woman with the strange silver eyes seemed to sense it, too. “What a restless little thing you’ve got living inside you,” she murmured, pacing like a beast sizing up its prey.
My grip tightened on my sword.
“You feel it, don’t you? Something waking. Something—”
Severin held up his hand in a languid gesture, and she fell silent immediately.
“That isn’t why we’re here tonight,” he said, his voice taking on a note of mild reproach, as though correcting a student who’d spoken out of turn.
“Tonight, we’ve come to deal with a traitor.
We only wanted to say hello to you in the meantime.
To check on your progress.” He folded his hands together with clerical composure. “Two birds, one stone and all that.”
“…Progress?”
“Aleks!” Nova’s distant voice cut through the darkness like a blade.
Severin turned toward the sound, smiling.
I instinctively circled around, putting myself between him and the direction Nova was approaching from.
His gaze slowly trailed back to me. Something like amusement flickered in his expression.
“I have to say, it’s disappointing to see you still wanting to protect her.
But Maris is right.” He tossed a cursory glance at the white-haired woman.
“It’s only a matter of time until it all shifts.
You can’t fight what’s been written in your blood, after all. ”
I withdrew my sword, channeling a thread of light through the blade until it glowed faintly in the darkness.
The entire group before me unsheathed their weapons in response, the sound of metal on leather whispering through the damp air. I saw more figures emerging from the shadows—at least two dozen in total.
Severin tsked softly as his gaze swept over my weapon. His smile faded, replaced by something colder—though no less composed. The change was subtle, like watching frost creep across glass. “Why don’t you put that away?”
I lifted it, pointing the glowing tip directly at his chest. “Why don’t I run it through your fucking heart instead?”
“How valiant.” He didn’t flinch at my blade, didn’t even bother to shift his stance.
He only clasped his hands behind his back and said, “You want to believe you’re the hero who will find a way to protect her no matter what, don’t you?
But deep down, you know the truth, Aleksander.
You can’t protect her. You aren’t meant to protect her. ”
My pulse quickened. This felt like a nightmare. Like I’d fallen asleep and dreamed that the greatest fear I had—the fear that I might end up a danger to Nova—might be coming true.
I just needed to wake up.
Somehow, I needed to wake up.
“I suppose it will make it all the more satisfying when you finally do admit the truth,” said Severin.
I sent another pulse of light through my weapon, brighter this time. A warning.
Nova sounded as if she was getting closer—and she clearly wasn’t alone.
Maris looked to Severin as if asking for permission.
He cracked his knuckles one by one, the sound sharp and deliberate in the stillness. “Maybe we have time for a bit of fun after all. Something like a test, perhaps.”
In the next instant, Nova burst through the tree line, Grimnor in hand, shadows writhing around her like snakes.
Phantom followed closely at her heels, a blazing black cloud that would have been lost in the dark if not for the eerie glow of his blue eyes. Thalia was right behind them, staff raised and ready. Zayn came from the opposite direction, moving with lethal grace.
My gaze lingered on Thalia. She had the sliver of Lorien’s soul in her possession—I couldn’t see it, but I could feel it. That familiar pull, that hunger in my magic that I’d been fighting all night…
“Aleks!” Nova’s voice again, right beside me this time. I flinched at the sound; my vision had blacked out for an instant, maybe longer.
“Aleks? What’s going on?” She sounded confused now. Maybe a bit frightened—of me, or for me, I couldn’t tell.
I didn’t have a chance to reply.
The attack came from all sides at once.
I moved on instinct, my sword finding its first target before I’d consciously decided to act. The Order member crumpled with a choked gasp, blood blooming across his chest.
Zayn withdrew his own sword, while Thalia readied her staff, using it to pull in some of the shadows drifting around Nova and channeling them into something more solid—into whips made of pure darkness.