Chapter 22
Chapter Twenty-Two
The realization hit like the hand of a goddess, as plain as day, a weighty sense of fate. That was where I needed to be and where I needed to go.
When I met Livvy’s gaze, hers burned, her cheeks wet and fiery.
“I think so too,” she murmured. “I think there’s only one way to reach the Aether and restore the balance. Power can’t be created. The energy comes from somewhere. Existence is a balancing act. The things we’ve put into motion…” She stopped. “But I don’t want to see it happen.”
My throat clogged. “So you understand?”
She nodded. “I do. Maybe it’s meant to be.”
I wasn’t the only one who thought about it, then, that maybe I was never supposed to have lived, never supposed to exist. Maybe the Summerlands were always meant to be my final destination.
Although Livvy’s optimism painted an entirely different picture.
She summoned a watery smile as though I’d have to die, but I’d also come back and everything would be okay. As though the step into death was only a step through a gateway, albeit one with a different exit.
I didn’t want the others to know. I didn’t want them around for this even if it meant not saying goodbye to the people I cared about.
“We’ve already wasted enough time,” I said. “Let’s get this over with.”
But my body refused to move.
Fear was deadly. It consumed everything it touched, but having my mom there, with the chance to get close to her in a way I’d never thought possible, it helped.
She dragged me into a hug and I clung to her.
“What if it hurts to die? To actually die?” I asked into her hair.
I’d come back from the edge too many times to count now, lingering at the entrance to the Summerlands. All to talk to Faerie.
Which one, my mother or I, held the other the tightest? As if it might be the last time?
And the reality was it actually might be the last.
Noren scooted closer and pushed his head between us with a low grumbling whine. He linked us, found space where there was none to spare. I breathed in the familiar scent of his fur, absorbed the heat rolling off of him like Noren was the furnace we needed on the coldest winter night.
“It’s not really goodbye. Not yet, boy,” I promised him. “I’ll be back. This is just something I have to do first.”
“Exactly.” Livvy sniffed, keeping hold of me while she leaned back to brush her hand against her eyes. “It won’t hurt, honey. I promise you. There are ways to send you to the Summerlands with comfort and peace. It doesn’t have to be painful.”
I’d had enough pain to last me the rest of my probably short life.
“But you have to tell the others,” she added.
I shook my head. “No. They’ll freak out.”
It was a mother’s gift to soothe, to brush a different kind of magic across the rough and jagged parts of my psyche. My hands still shook. A sound like a wounded dog begged to crawl out of me but I lashed it down.
“They deserve to know,” Livvy insisted. “You can’t do this without their support. So speak to them. Do it for me. Please. I want you to have friends behind you, okay?”
A brittle pain gnawed at my collarbone. “You want to get into an argument about this now? I’ll fight you. This should be as uncomplicated as possible.”
I was ready. Wasn’t I?
I wanted to get this over with, not bring it to a boil, or mark it like minutes at a meeting. Hey, all, I’m gonna go die, but it’s fine because it’s what I’ve got to do. No worries! What’s our next topic of discussion?
Livvy’s hands tightened, squeezed, a flash of pain from her nails punctuating the moment. “They’re your family, Tavi. Tell them the next step and let them support you.”
Her insistence, Noren’s bulk pushing against my shoulders to get me moving, were the only two things capable of propelling me into the war room at this late hour.
We weren’t even sure the Aether needed my help. Only…
I’d been inside one of Poppy’s prophecies. I understood the repercussions of my unlocking without needing a mission objective handed down.
Earth, air, water, fire…and spirit.
Those were the building blocks of this world, of any world.
Each step awkward, I took this knowledge to the inner council of my closest friends. I delivered it mincingly, on a velvety pillow of excuses on why it would be safe.
Most of them, roused from sleep, took longer than usual to understand the intricacies of the story I wove for them. Some, like Mike and Melia, had already been up and stressed to their limits.
They were the first to leap into action.
“Absolutely not.” Mike’s fingers curled into a fist on the table. “You want to spoon-feed us something about going to the Summerlands without calling it what it is. Suicide.”
The word bled from his lips, harsh, irrevocable. It sullied the air in the room and Bronwen turned away from us with a shake of her head, wrapping her torso with her arms.
“It’s the only way the Aether will get the help they deserve,” I insisted. “It’s already been set in motion, Mike. It’s not something we can stop.”
“But you don’t know if they need help,” Melia protested. “You have no idea what they’re going through because no one does! The Aether…? No one has ever seen them.”
Mike’s grip threatened to upend the table. “They might not actually exist and you want to kill yourself for nothing.”
His cheeks reddened like overripe strawberries, and the others reacted similarly. Which was to say they were pissed and about to explode. My latest gamble wasn’t guaranteed to pay off.
They wanted certainty in a world where possible realities fed into each other and no clear answer, or end, was in sight.
“No.” His jaw worked furiously. “Absolutely one hundred percent without a shadow of a fucking doubt no, Tavi.”
I’ve already made the choice.
Why couldn’t I get the words out?
Coral hiked her thumb towards Mike. “I’m with him on this. You’re out of your mind! The rebellion is in its baby stage and you want to jump ship for no reason. No concrete reason, anyway. Sometimes your gut isn’t right.”
“I have the best reason. This is a journey Faerie set me on. The people I’ve helped have been elemental based.” I ticked off the points on my hand. “Spirit is the bond keeping the elements together. It’s the basis of our magic. I have to do this. I’m the only one who can.”
“And the rebellion?” Bronwen asked. “The people you’ve brought here, who think they’ll be fighting with you? What about them?”
The spotlight burned a hole in the top of my skull. I scratched behind Noren’s ears to distract myself. “I’m doing this for them.”
My friends, my family, the people I loved raised their voices to the rafters of our war room. Their individual complaints merged together into a single drone. Hands itching to cover my ears and block it out, I strained against being battered by an entirely different element.
Emotion.
This journey was not the only thing put in motion that would not stop. So were their feelings.
I closed my eyes, stealing one deep breath after another until Mike gripped my shoulders and turned me to face him.
“Please, I’m begging you. Try astral walking first. Before you jump into something you can’t take back. Let me show you how to do it. I’ll teach you, and if it works, that has to be the way you help the ethereal folk.”
I forced myself to look up at Mike and meet his eyes when it felt easier to sink into the floor. “I don’t think it’s going to be effective.”
He arched a brow. “You’re fighting about me wanting you to live?”
When I was positive I had to die…?
“If I’m meant to die, then astral walking isn’t going to do anything,” I said.
The fighting erupted anew.
“I’m not even surprised. How are we related?” Coral groaned. “I’ve never seen a person value their life less.”
“Tavi, you’ve never acted like this before. Why are you refusing to let us help you?” Melia crept closer to tears with every syllable.
“All the fighting we’ve already done to survive and this is how you want to play it,” Bronwen added.
The only person who didn’t add her opinion to the debate was Livvy.
Mike squeezed me hard enough to bruise. “At least try astral walking first. I’m an adept. It’s not my inherent power but it’s something the royal line has been trained in for centuries. I’ve been tutored to walk through dreams since I was a baby.”
Deep in my heart, understanding swelled. Astral walking wouldn’t work.
Nothing would unless I gave it all up. That was the unspoken, unwritten condition of unlocking my full powers, giving back to the world that gave everything to me.
But I cast my glance wide at the circle of people struggling hard to keep me alive and my eyes burned.
I swallowed back tears. “Fine, I’ll try it.”
* * *
I stole a few hours of sleep. Midmorning, as Fevar began to arrive in their caravans, Mike and I made our way to the same area of the riverbank where Livvy and I sat earlier.
His hand clung tightly to mine, as though to meld our skin together. To force us to become the same body and soul and beating heart.
If this was the final moment we spent together, then seconds counted. They stacked on top of one another and yet never amounted to what I wanted them to be.
I wanted forever.
But in the molecules of my being I knew I was meant to save the Aether. I left the rebellion, the baby Coral defined it to be, in capable hands. The people I cared about would use tooth and nail and magic to accomplish their goals.
Hopefully Livvy was right and I’d come right back, but in case I didn’t—
I appreciated Mike’s aid as we traversed gnarled limbs deep in the forest. Noren was a blur of fur around us. He circled to watch the proceedings and protected a wide perimeter.
We reached the river, but at a spot I’d not previously explored.
“Okay, let’s rest here,” Mike said finally. “Lie down.”
“Not sit?”
“I want you to be comfortable. This is actually a pretty cool spot.” He guided me between the stretching arms of roots to the sandy soil beneath, pushed upward and softened by shade and weather. “I come here to get my mind right when you’re gone.”
“I didn’t know you were an astral walker,” I said as I settled.