Chapter 16
Chapter
Sixteen
MAEVE
The silver glow of the full moon illuminated the pale swirls on my skin. Fully healed and no longer wrapped, I watched the subtle glimmering of the markings on both arms now. The sparkling stars seemed to twinkle on my skin, even more glorious under the faded twilight.
I sat on a bench in the courtyard, Pia and Delani on either side of me. Sawyer and Kohen stood across the way, using their swords for a little late night sparring practice.
“There's a time and a place, guys!” Pia hollered, her hands cupped around her mouth.
They couldn’t hear her over the clash of metal and swearing when Kohen accidentally nicked Sawyer’s elbow. There was barely any blood, but he tackled Kohen to the ground in defense.
“That’s my favorite elbow!” Sawyer shouted, attempting to pin Kohen's wrists.
“Who the hell has a favorite elbow?” Kohen hollered, thrashing in the grass.
“Me, asswipe!”
“At what age do men grow up?” Pia inquired with a huff, crossing her arms.
Delani spat out a laugh. “Only the gods know the answer to that. But if I had a guess, I’d say that they’ll be like this until the day they die.”
My knee bounced as I anxiously awaited Venay’s arrival. If this worked, we could leave in the morning to help Seb.
This had to work.
“Maeve, I know tonight isn't the best night for a party, but Pia and me were thinking that once Seb is back and everything is settled, we could celebrate your birthday?” Delani offered cautiously.
My foot tapped rapidly. “Eh. I’d rather not, if I’m being honest.”
I hated this day. Ever since last year.
My fingers toyed with the pendant from my mother—the last gift she ever gave me. I could almost hear her voice calling me her star, though it was jumbled with Blythe saying the same thing. I cursed the goddess for tainting one of my favorite memories of my mother.
“Not a choice,” Pia snipped. “You know how much I love a good party, and Kohen didn't let me do anything for his birthday, so I’m feeling deprived.”
“Sawyer’s birthday is in the fall. Plan one for him.”
“I will, but I’m planning one for you, too.”
“Oh, whatever,” I grumbled, my eyes settling upon the twilight sky as a stream of blue and green meteors darted through some lingering clouds.
At the height of my anxiety, Venay danced into the courtyard, her lace gown kissing the grass as she approached.
“Did you bring it?” she asked me, jumping right into business.
I nodded, rising to meet her and handing over Cicily’s dagger. I was relieved to find that Sebastian had left the particular weapon home when he went on his last endeavor to Draemor. “Why do you need this?”
She took it gently from my hands, slowly inhaling a deep breath when it touched her skin. “Ah, it’s almost as if she is here with us.” She sighed upon her exhale. “I needed an item that is connected to Cicily and the Hawthorne bloodline. You said that this belongs to Sebastian now?”
“Yeah,” Sawyer jumped in, holding pressure on his elbow.
“Really milking that paper cut, Sawyer, huh?” Pia taunted.
Venay interrupted Sawyer’s sharp remark. “Hmm…Well, it should still work, but be prepared, whoever we use may feel uncomfortable during the process.”
“What does that mean?” Sawyer snarled, his tone accusatory.
“The dagger is connected directly to the Hawthornes. Formerly Cicily, and now Sebastian. With the magic we are about to perform, you will have a direct line to Sebastian. You may feel the things he is feeling. You may even see some of the things he is seeing,” Venay replied as if the statement was nothing new to her.
“How will that help us find the journal?” Pia raised the question that I was already thinking.
“It's like a map. The journal is directly linked to Cicily, who is linked to Sebastian. The both of them are linked to the dagger. I can use the dagger to momentarily tie myself to their bloodline, which should allow me to trace the journal. In the process though, we may break through to Sebastian,” Venay explained it all so fluently, that it almost made sense the first time I tried to process it.
“I don’t get it, but I’m not the enchanter, so I’ll take your word for it,” Sawyer retorted, his muscles flexing when he crossed his arms over his chest.
Venay held her composure. “I need one of you to volunteer—”
I didn’t let her finish. “I’ll do it.”
She shook her head. “No. Your new power is too unpredictable.” Her silver eyes roamed over the others. “Which one of you has the strongest mental stability?”
Sawyer tried—and failed—to fight back an obnoxious laugh. “Okay, so you wouldn't have been able to use Maeve anyway.”
I flipped him off.
“In all seriousness though, and no offense to anyone, but probably Kohen or myself. We're the most experienced with our magic, and have years of soldier-hood under our belts,” Sawyer added.
Kohen agreed and thus offered himself. “I’ll do it.”
“Very well,” Venay approved, ushering him to follow her. The rest of us stayed back to watch as the two of them took a seat on the patio residing in the center of the courtyard.
Pia brought a hand to her mouth, chewing her nails. “I don’t want Kohen to be in pain.”
Sawyer placed a hand on her shoulder. “Whatever pain he’ll feel won’t be nearly as bad as what Seb is going through.”
“Is that supposed to make me feel better?” she scoffed, a disgusted glare stuck on her face as she brushed his arm away.
“Not really. I’m just saying.” He shrugged innocently.
Venay and Kohen sat on their knees across from each other. I couldn’t hear, but she appeared to be explaining the process to Kohen, who gulped as he leisurely nodded.
Venay pulled a peach-sized stone from the pocket of her robe, placing it on the ground in front of her.
She took one of Kohen’s hands and without hesitation, used Cicily's diamond dagger to slice through his palm.
Blood trickled free from the gash as Venay balanced the blade on the stone between them.
Kohen made a fist, holding it above the knife and squeezing blood out onto it.
At Venay’s nod of approval, his eyes sealed.
She took his hands back, closing her own eyelids and chanting something in a language I did not recognize.
The moment the words fled her lips, a shimmering glow was drawn from the sky.
It sank into the dagger, the luminescence lingering on top of it in some sort of viscous substance.
Moonlight.
“Woah,” Delani whispered in total awe.
“What the fuck is she doing?” Sawyer muttered.
“Looks like some sort of rite,” I replied through tight lips.
“It looks like dark magic,” Pia corrected, apprehension wrapped around her words.
“Wait. Is an enchanter just a nice way of saying someone who practices dark magic?” Sawyer inquired with a tilted brow.
I shuddered. The things Venay had shown us thus far—her integrity testing and now this—were not in the realm of natural god-gifted power.
“I guess? Maybe that's part of it? I dunno what exactly an enchanter is. I always thought it was something you were born with, like being a seer, but maybe I was wrong,” Pia answered.
“How do you even learn such a skill?” Sawyer added with undisguised curiosity.
“I don’t know. But can you really call it a skill? Surely you remember what they taught you in primary school?” Pia responded sharply.
“Dark magic is a horrific sin in the eye of the gods and may prevent you from being allowed beyond the veil after death, instead forcing your lost soul to wander the planet forever—though only if the gods determine that you used unnatural magic for the wrong reasons,” I sputtered out the answer as if I had just learned of its truth from the lines of my history textbook.
Sawyer shifted his attention towards Kohen and gulped. “What would be considered a right reason?”
I pondered for all of a second. “This, I suppose, since it’s being used to help someone. Challenging the honesty of others. Neither of those things seem overly wrong in my opinion, but I suppose that will be up to the gods when it’s time for her soul to venture into the veil.”
“Okay. But—”
I turned towards him. “I don’t know, Sawyer. I’m not a god. But Venay clearly knows more about this than we do, and she doesn’t seem overly concerned about her afterlife, now does she?”
Our conversation vanished when Kohen’s body jolted back. Venay relinquished her hold on him and he used his palms to brace himself on the stone. She continued to chant, dropping her neck back and lifting her arms towards the veil.
The moonlight attracted to the glinting dagger, the steady glow intensifying with every blink of my eyes. Kohen's blood blended with the cosmic energy, and the two substances curdled together before settling in a clump on top of the blade.
“Definitely dark magic,” Sawyer whispered into my ear.
Kohen shrieked, the nightmarish scream so primally raw that it made my eardrums ache.
Sawyer’s arm shot out in front of Pia as she leapt forward, keeping her back. “Don’t.”
“It’s okay.” My arms wrapped around her from behind, holding her quaking torso still.
“I can’t watch,” she stuttered, turning her neck to the side.
“You don’t have to. Close your eyes.” I took her hands in mine, directing them upwards to block her vision.
Venay’s pale, gaunt hands settled upon Kohen’s head, applying pressure and keeping him down. Her chanting ceased when her head fell to watch him thrash. She was completely frozen while he wailed with each jerk and anomalous whip of his body.
A sheen of sweat dripped down Kohen’s forehead—his brown hair already soaked with it. Tears streamed down his caramel skin while his head convulsed side to side as if he was in pure denial of what he was seeing.
Mother of gods. I felt horrible for him, and though I would have taken his place in a heartbeat, a part of me was grateful that I wasn’t in his place.